Halloween Night part 2 - Jesse's Revenge

A Nightmare on Elm Street part 2 - Freddy's Revenge

As I mentioned yesterday I only had time to watch one horror movie this Halloween night. I wanted something short, familiar but that I'd never really seen & I have an Elm Street box set that I still haven't worked through yet. So I decided to finally watch the first sequel to the original movie. Spoilers follow for a 30 year old movie. 

I had read a lot about this film during my Film Studies degree when I was at university. This film is infamous as a prime example of a "queer theory" reading, something which has permeated through to pop culture and discourse around the movie. It was pretty blatant but with some things which don't fit necessarily. But we'll get to that. 

The movie opens with a pretty fantastic sequence, especially for the 1980s as we are straight into a nightmare involving a school bus careening into a cavern that winds up looking like an old death-metal album cover. The titular antagonist appears to a helpless Jesse (mocked by & powerless to protect two women, interestingly) and forces him to wake with a pretty girly scream if I'm brutally honest. Still the best sequence in the film though, it's just a shame it's literally the first few minutes. 

The plot, such as it is, develops from here and really kicks the queer readings into high gear; Jesse has a girl friend who he has yet to make a move on, despite visible interest. When prompted on this by the hunky school bully he proceeds to wrestle him in a homo-erotic display that would make the volleyball scene in Top Gun blush. It's also established here that the strict gym teacher has a masochistic streak with his boys, even being rumoured to frequent S&M fetish clubs. In the 80s it's probably quite deliberate that homosexuality was viewed as a similar deviant fetish, which I don't love. The shades of films like Carrie here are kind of cool but the film doesn't linger beyond any interest in the "male deviance" it wants to set up. Indeed Jesse's next nightmare sees Freddy almost caressing Jesse as he literally says that he "needs" him because "he's got the body"; a stretched reading perhaps but given the set-up it's hard to ignore. 

This leads us into the main thrust (no pun intended) of the movie; ostensibly a possession plot that Freddy wants to "come out" of Jesse into the real world, stalking his subconscious & making him act in ways that he finds uncomfortable. On face value this plot could have been a really interesting horror twist on the ideas set up by Wes Craven's first movie but the film makes no attempt to reconcile this with any of the "rules" established there. Instead a lot of critics have read this story as a horror allegory for closeted homosexuality. It's hard to disagree during the film's most notorious scene in which Jesse genuinely sleepwalks into a gay bar, encounters his "deviant" teacher & goes back to the locker room with him for a punishment that seems way past a school employees jurisdiction. During this punishment "Freddy" (acting through Jesse & as an unseen force) strips the teacher naked, whips his bare butt raw with towels, claws down his back and then slashes him to death. I promise I'm not making any of that up! I could review this scene but honestly it was so overly blatant that I just found it hilarious. Is that good? I'm guessing not for a horror movie.

The film proceeds with Jesse finding himself compelled to attack his younger sister; either an attempt to negate the queer reading or an incredibly troubling equating of homosexuality to paedophilia. Thankfully this is brief and we end up at a house party where Jesse begins to finally make out with his girlfriend. In the heat of passion Freddy's tongue begins to emerge from Jesse. This is a possible homage to the original "I'm your boyfriend now, Nancy" scene but it confused me; is it another attempt to move away from the idea that only homosexual passion is triggering the "deviance", is it implying bisexuality or is it a symbol of disgust? Either way the film doesn't take long to return to form; subtext rapidly becoming text as Jesse runs to his (now befriended) school bully's room to stay the night. Again, I had to laugh as I wanted to try & review the movie fairly and not read into it but then it gave us this exchange;

At this point I gave up any attempt to look beyond the obvious interpretation and surrendered to the fact that all the critics were very right. From Jesse "birthing" Freddy in Alien-style when sleeping next to Grady, to eventually having Jesse cured by the loving kiss of a good woman. It doesn't help that Jesse actor Mark Patton was also gay and has since described in detail how incredibly uncomfortable he was with the things he was made to do. Check out his writing and both his documentary and "Never Sleep Again" for more fascinating insights than I can get into here.

Regarding my attempt to review the horror elements here, the movie doesn't fare well. Every murder takes place inexplicably in the real world, abandoning the entire established lore and unique point of this universe. Indeed both Robert Englund (Freddy) & several production crew have stated this as their least favourite Elm Street movie, mainly for that reason. And as Freddy chases teens round a pool party like a generic slasher he ends up looking totally ridiculous, with none of the powers and thus menace he was imbued with by his debut.

Overall this is certainly a fascinating movie. In a way it's worth watching just to believe it and understand the masses of writing & making-of material surrounding it (which seems largely better than the movie). There's some occasional good effects, some surprisingly decent acting and it's all wonderfully eighties-tinged. Easily the worst Elm Street movie I've ever seen but far from the worst horror. Watchable to study, laugh at or just kill 90 minutes watching schlock. But as a representation of Freddy; this film is a total nightmare.

**1/2 (2.5/5)