Day 3 – An Italian poster for the original release of Wes Craven’s A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984).
Check out the rest of this year’s “31 Days of Horror” posts here.
Year – 1975
Decade – 1970s
Cinematographer – Gabor Pogany
Director – Aldo Lado
Aspect Ratio – 1.85
Genre – Horror
Lenses – Spherical
Format – 35mm
Other Key Words – Video Nasties; Color (Blue); Zooms; 180 Degree Pan; Shot/Reverse Shot; Phone Calls
Click on any link for a list of other films featuring frames from that category.
“Every seat in this theater becomes a coach seat to hell!” – tagline from the Night Train Murders trailer
“I’d read an article in the L.A. Times about a family who had escaped the Killing Fields in Cambodia and managed to get to the U.S. Things were fine, and then suddenly the young son was having very disturbing nightmares. He told his parents he was afraid that if he slept, the thing chasing him would get him, so he tried to stay awake for days at a time. When he finally fell asleep, his parents thought this crisis was over. Then they heard screams in the middle of the night. By the time they got to him, he was dead. He died in the middle of a nightmare. Here was a youngster having a vision of a horror that everyone older was denying. That became the central line of Nightmare on Elm Street.” – Wes Craven on the origin of A Nightmare on Elm Street, from Vulture’s oral history of the film.
I was planning on running this as part of the blog’s annual October horror movie tribute, but with the passing of Wes Craven yesterday it seemed appropriate to just go ahead and share it. The pic above and the quote below both come from this fantastic Rolling Stone oral history of Craven’s original A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984).
“Jim Doyle [Elm Street’s mechanical special effects designer, wielding the glove in the picture above] was in a scuba suit underneath me. I was sitting on a two-by-four across a bathtub that had the bottom cut out, and beneath me was a tank made out of plywood, filled with water. It was a challenge to keep it at a temperature that wouldn’t completely be unreasonable; you would get slightly cold just sitting there. What I remember mainly are the sounds. Wes told Jim, “I’m going to bang on the bathtub when I want you to stick the claw out.” So Jim is blindly plunging that thing between my legs. One time it’s too far to the right, next time it’s too far to the left, then it’s way too fast — and Wes just patiently waited until he got the take that he wanted.” – Heather Langenkamp
Check out more in the Shot Behind the Shot series here.
Director Wes Craven (on the right, in cargo pants and sunglasses) on the set of 1988’s The Serpent and the Rainbow.
Craven recently redesigned his official site, which now includes a gallery of behind the scenes stills documenting his 40-plus years making fright flicks. Here’s a small sampling: Continue Reading ›
A newly commissioned poster by Chris Garofalo for an upcoming screening of Shocker, Wes Craven’s ill-fated attempt to create another Nightmare on Elmstreet-esque slasher franchise.
The film will be playing this Friday (March 21st) at the Colonial Theatre, which is about 30 miles outside of Philadelphia. Check here for more info on the screening.
Director Wes Craven (right) prepares to shoot the death scene of actress Amanda Wyss (left) in the original NIghtmare on Elm Street (1984). The pic comes from the blog Kino Images. Continue Reading ›
The Last House on the Left (1972)
Wes Craven began his career with a pair of sadistic 1970s shockers (The Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes) that explored the capability for violence of middle-class Americans placed under extreme duress. By the time Scream 4 was released nearly three decades later, Craven was best known for winking post-modern teen slasher pics. (continue reading) Continue Reading ›
