Eye For Film >> Movies >> A Nightmare On Elm Street 5: The Dream Child (1989) Blu-Ray Review
A Nightmare On Elm Street 5: The Dream Child
Reviewed by: James Gracey
Read James Gracey's film review of A Nightmare On Elm Street 5: The Dream ChildAside from the fodder in the form of two cheesy and very dated music videos (Are You Ready for Freddy? By Fat Boys and Anyway I Gotta Swing It by Whodini) and the obligatory theatrical trailer, the only other extra feature here is Behind the Story, a collection of brief featurettes looking at various aspects of the production of The Dream Child.
Womb Raiders delves into the origins of the story and the admittedly interesting central concept (Freddy Krueger reaching his victims through the dreams of an unborn child). Director Stephen Hopkins and producer Rachel Talalay discuss the issues they tackled in deciding where to bring the series after the success of Part 4. Various writers such as John Skipp and Craig Spector talk about the endless rewrites and how they each tried to bring something interesting to the mix, with a particular emphasis on exploring the world of dreams and the subconscious. As with Snakes and Ladders on the Dream Warriors disc and Psycho Sexual Circus on Freddy’s Revenge, the strangely sexual imagery of the series is discussed by Talalay, who admits that the womb like spaces and yonic hallways in The Dream Child were a little more intentional, given the central concept.
The Sticky Floor provides a glance at some of the special effects from various crew members such as visual effects supervisor Alan Monroe, who shares an interesting and humorous anecdote about working in a hot studio with shards of broken sugar-glass melting and congealing all over the floor. Robert Englund opens up about his issues with the franchise, while Take the Stairs is a very brief look at the MC Escher inspired production design of the climatic scenes. Hopkins Directs and A Slight Miscalculation are blink and you’ll miss them behind the scenes footage of Hopkins directing Englund and Talalay revealing that in hindsight, this maybe wasn’t the best subject matter for a teen movie.
Reviewed on: 13 Oct 2014