Directed by: Jack Sholder
Written by: David Chaskin
Music by: Christopher Young
Starring: Mark Patton, Kim Myers, Robert Rusler, Clu Gulager, Hope Lange, Robert Englund
Taglines: “The first name in terror returns…”
“The Man of Your Dreams Is Back.”
“Someone is coming back to Elm Street!”
SYNOPSIS
Following the events of the first film, Nancy and her family have left Springwood. Their house is bought by a new family, whose son Jesse starts to have strange dreams about Freddy Krueger, who wants to use Jesse to return to the real world.
OPINION
With the original Elm Street being a phenomenal success, the sequels would seem to be inevitable. So it was, although original creator Wes Craven wanted nothing to do with it at this point. New Line upped the budget slightly and brought in Jack Sholder to take over directorial regins. While not as legendary as Craven, Sholder is a decent director with a few good movies later under his belt (including The Hidden and 12:01 although later descended into DTV hell) and a well-received debut (Alone In The Dark, not related to the games or Uwe Boll atrocity of the same name).
However, the script later brought the film some notoriety in ways that Sholder and producer Robert Shaye claim to be unaware of (although Robert Englund claims to have been fully aware) – writer
David Chaskin’s script is chock full of homoerotic subtexts. I can kind of believe their ignorance, if only because when I first watched the movie I was only about 13 years old and too young to grasp the subtexts. Now, especially armed with the knowledge that they’re there, it’s very difficult to avoid them!
The most obvious of these are the central theme of the movie. For whatever reason, Chaskin had decided to jettison the central themes familiar from the original (and later movies) – it seems to be the house rather than Freddy’s desire for revenge that allows his return. Latching on to Jesse, he essentially appears as a split part to Jesse’s personality, with Jesse himself not knowing if Freddy is killing those around him in dreams he happens to share, or if he’s actually committing the murders. With Jesse trying to repress that part of him that’s connected to Freddy and the idea that Freddy wants to “come out” into the world, it’s not hard to pick up on the subtext.
There’s many other things that suggest this – the almost homoerotic relationship between Jesse and his best friend, the leather bar he has an encounter with his gym teacher (and the later whipping the teacher gets), the fact that he seems to relate so much more to the male rather than female characters, the stupid dancing in his room scene (to the original version of Touch Me (All Night Long), no less!). With the knowledge it’s there, the subtext is hard to avoid, but I could imagine a less clued-in director could miss those themes in the script, especially in the mid-80s.
But, enough of that, what about the movie as a horror film? Overall, it’s not bad. It’s certainly one of the weaker films in the series (though I would still class part 5 as the worst by a long shot). Part of the problem is that we’re already heading away from the pure surrealism of Craven’s original into something more conventional. I have read that there were meant to be a lot more weird moments, but that the money started to run out and compromises had to be made. Some moments are actually more funny than anything (the exploding parrot!). Even so, Freddy is in the film for a disappointingly short amount of time. When he’s there, it’s great – he rips part of his head off to reveal his brains (“You’ve got the body, I’ve got the brains!”). The shower sequence is pretty horrific, and the scene where (spoiler!) Freddy actually comes out of Jesse’s body and starts slaughtering pool party attendees is fantastic.
But, there’s really not enough here. The script meanders, it deviates so far from the central mythos that it’s almost a parallel universe story than a legitimate sequel, and it’s not that interesting for the most part. After a slight peak with the pool party sequence, the script again becomes muddled with a particularly weak ending. Had this not been an Elm Street movie, it might have been interesting with another villain, but it almost has to disappoint when compared with most other films in the franchise. It’s worth a look if you’ve already seen the better movies in the series, but I’d definitely recommend watch almost any of the others before this one.
AVAILABILITY
There’s numerous releases of this film, sadly all pretty much barebones. The US Blu-Ray is a barebones release containing parts 2 &3, while the film is available either separately or as part of a box set with a feature set outside of the US. Worth a buy, if only for the superior part 3, which I’ll get to soon!
Rating: 
