A Nightmare on Elm Street
Year of Release - 1984
Rating ? R
Director ? Wes Craven
Running Time ? 91 Minutes
Distributor ? New Line Cinema
Wes Craven?s genre defining 80?s horror flick has almost become the thing of legend. It?s not often that a character in the horror genre penetrates pop culture in the way that Nightmare?s Freddy Krueger has. There have been dolls, action figures, posters, buttons, TV shows, video games, Halloween costumes (did I mention all of the movies?) and more. The razor glove wielding maniac speaks to multiple generations, including those that aren?t even old enough to see the films he hacks and slashes his way through. An early adopter of the DVD format, New Line had previously packaged all of the Nightmare films in a box set and while fans were happy; they?ve been screaming for special editions ever since.
Presented as an InfinifilmTM 2-Disc set, the first Nightmare is shown much love with this DVD presentation. The film itself has never looked or sounded better, so this alone makes it worth the affordable price of admission. However, it?s the DVD extras that really shine here. This set is just loaded with all kinds of goodies sure to satisfy even the most die-hard blood-crazed Nightmare fans.
Extras on this release are massive and while we?re not going to give you the complete rundown (where is the fun in that?) we are however going to list some highlights and whet your gruesome little appetite with some teases. Just know that this is bar none the most comprehensive release of A Nightmare on Elm Street on home video to date, ?nuff said.
Disc One starts off with 2 feature length commentaries and New Line?s patented InfinifilmTM feature which allows the user to access bonus features while watching the film. It?s neat, but not very practical. Disc Two includes 2 short documentary features (about 45-minutes total), discussing New Line?s horror output and the origins of dreams in horror. Also included are deleted scenes and a pretty comprehensive making-of that runs nearly an hour. Look for a few other goodies sprinkled throughout the second disc as well.
While fans may be a bit reluctant to double dip (and who can blame them) New Line has really gone above and beyond with this release. We really couldn?t have asked for much more than this, highly recommended.
