A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (Chuck Russell, 1987)

To be fair, Heather Langenkamp's Nancy Thompson was only sixteen or seventeen years-old in the first movie (even though, according to her, she looked twenty). In other words, I shouldn't have expected too much, as far as sophistication goes, when it came to her clothes and make-up. Unwilling to cut her and her movie a break, I deemed A Nightmare on Elm Street as un-reviewable after it was over. Not giving me much to work with when it came to style and fashion, I rejected the film on that basis, and that basis alone. Don't get me wrong, the film, written and directed by Wes Craven (The People Under the Stairs), is definitely well-made. It just failed to move me. On the other hand, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge did nothing but move me. Seriously, I love that movie. With my interest in the Freddy K. saga reinvigorated thanks to the gayest horror sequel the 1980s ever produced, I was ready to continue my journey down Elm Street. Unfortunately, the first name listed in the opening credits for A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors was Heather Langenkamp. This caused me much alarm, as I feared that part three would be a repeat of what happened in the first film. Sure, this one is directed by Chuck Russell, who also made the amazing remake of The Blob. But that being said, my expectations, I have to say, were pretty low as things got underway.

My mood perked up almost immediately, however, as Chuck Russell's immense talent as a filmmaker is clearly evident in the opening scene. Which features Patricia Arquette's Kirsten Parker wandering through a creepy nightmare-world. It's true, all the films in the series so far (even Mahalkaal, the Bollywood remake of the first film) boast opening scenes that feature frightened dreamers exploring the sinister confines of their own nightmares. But the scene that opens A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors is way more polished than the others.

So, like I said, I was in a good mood. What I mean is. I'm not going to let Heather Langenkamp's lack of flair in the fashion department ruin what could potentially be a pretty effective horror sequel.

After Kristen Parker's weird dream is over, her mega-milf of a mom, Elaine (the smokin' hot Brooke Bundy), finds her in the bathroom in the process of slitting her wrists. Even though we know that Fred Krueger (Robert Englund) is the one responsible for the wrist cutting, her mom sends her to a  juvenile psych ward run by... YES!!!! The  juvenile psych ward Kirsten is sent to is run by Craig Wasson, who played the white pantie-loving, porn-curious voyeur in Body Double.

Just as an orderly named Max (Larry Fishburne) is finishing up giving the audience a tour of the ward, we hear a commotion transpiring down the hall. It would seem that Kristen is having a bit of a conniption fit. Grabbing a scalpel, Kirsten threatens to cut anyone, including Craig Wasson's Neil Gordon and Max the orderly, who stands in her way.

As she's singing the One, Two, Freddy's Coming For You nursery rhyme, and about to really go off the deep end, an über-chic woman walks in the door and defuses the situation with a devil may care brand of elan. Hugging the über-chic woman, as the hospital staff look on with amazement, Kristen... Hold on. I don't believe this. The über-chic woman is Heather Langenkamp!

I don't know what happened between the first movie and this one, but Nancy Thompson is no longer the gawky teen with terrible taste in clothes we once knew. No, what you're looking at now is a modern woman who knows how to throw together an ensemble in a pinch.

We're talking blazers, skirts with slits, pumps, hats, shawls, pearls, lipstick, earrings, and blouses... lot's of blouses. (Don't forget, she carries a purse now.) Oh, yeah. She carries a purse. You see, teenagers don't have much use for purses. Adult women, however, need purses. After all, where else are they gonna put their experimental anti-psychotic medication?

Oh, haven't you heard? Nancy Thompson takes this drug to keep Fred Krueger at bay. She suggests to Neil that his patients, including Kristen; Kincaid, a.k.a. "Cool Breeze" (Ken Sagos); Joey (Rodney Eastman); Phillip, a.k.a. "The Walker" (Bradley Gregg); Jennifer (Penelope Sudrow); Will, a.k.a. "The Wizard Master" (Ira Heiden); and Taryn (Jennifer Rubin), take the drug as well, but he's a tad hesitant, as he doesn't buy the whole "a knife-glove-wielding serial killer is tormenting the children of the parents who burned him to death in their dreams" story.

During her first night at the hospital, Kirsten is confronted in her dreams by Fred Krueger. Except, instead of simply slashing her to death with his knife-glove, Fred transforms himself into a giant worm. As the Fred worm is consuming Kristen, she decides to yell out Nancy's name. And lo and behold, Nancy hears her, and, get this, enters Kirsten's dream to help her. (Wait, she can do that?) Apparently. It's a pretty cool addition to the mythology.

The next day, all the patient characters I mentioned earlier and Nancy and Neil partake in a group session, where "straight-talk" is encouraged. Other than Taryn's weird hand gestures, the only other thing worth noting about this scene is that Phillip has a lot of dialogue. Hmm, I wonder if he's going to be Fred's first victim.

As Nancy and Neil talk Hypnocil (an experimental anti-psychotic medication) at Springwood's best and only Thai restaurant, and Joey and Will sleep in shifts (the logic being, they can wake each other if their dreams get too intense), Phillip begins to sleepwalk through the ward. Sounds innocent enough. Except, Phillip, a guy who makes marionette puppets in his spare time, is being controlled by Fred. And instead of using puppet string, Fred is using Phillip's tend... You know what? I can't finish talking about this scene. It has to be one of the most disturbing things I've ever seen.
  

While not as disturbing as the tendon puppet scene, the TV room scene is just as memorable. It also causes you to start paying attention to what the characters are saying. You see, Phillip mentions that he likes to make his own puppets, and he's killed in the manner I alluded to earlier. And the TV room character says something about wanting to be on television someday.

Well, I guess you can't really pay attention to what Joey says, as he doesn't talk. But he does openly lust after  Nurse Marcie (Stacey Alden), who, for some strange reason, doesn't wear white stockings (she does wear a white thong, though). Meaning, you can expect Fred to use Joey's thing for Nurse Marcie when it comes to time to fuck his shit up.

Anyway, the fact that each character's run-in with Fred corresponds with an aspect of their personality is one of the film's strong points. My favourite run-in, of course, being Fred's back-alley confrontation with Taryn, whose dream persona is a double switchblade-wielding punk rocker.

When I first saw Taryn (moping the halls of the hospital like a unkempt rag-doll), I was like: Why is she so goddamn frumpy? I mean, someone lend this girl a hair brush, stat. Little did I know that they were going to give her the punk makeover to end all punk makeovers later on in the movie.

Oh, and being that she's a recovering drug addict, Taryn should expect Fred to use her addiction against her when the time comes.

When it becomes obvious that Freddy plans on bumping off the youthful patients one by one, Nancy, Kristen and those not killed yet, decide to confront him as a team, or, you could say, confront him as "dream warriors."

While I'll admit, I have a major soft spot for A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge, I can't deny that A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors is superior in almost every way imaginable. Now, granted, it doesn't have part two's gay subtext, but there's more to life than gay subtexts. Seriously, the so-called "kills" are so wonderfully inventive, that you'll have no choice to look past the fact that it has zero gay subtext. Or maybe it does (have a gay subtext), and I just missed it. Nah.

Prayer of the Rollerboys (Rick King, 1990)

Rollerboys?!? What about Rollergirls? I mean, what's up with that? And while we're at it, where are the Rollerpeopleofcolour? I didn't see one black dude skating with the Rollerboys in the totally awesome, Prayer of the Rollerboys. What's that? Get the fuck out of here. Really? Even though I'm playing dumb, I've just been informed that the Rollerboys are a gang of white supremacists who view women as merely sex objects. Just for the record, I threw in the latter distinction because: A) They have no female members. And: B) You should have seen that party the Rollerboys staged midway through the film, it was like something straight out of Caligula or an Alex de Renzy flick. Welcome to the Los Angeles of the not-so distant future. Do you know how I know it's the "not-so distant future"? No, not because the city is rife with rollerblading racists who wear white winter coats. And not because Patrica Arquette is wearing a leopard-print jacket with a sailor hat (oh my god, I can't wait to talk about the outre outfits she wears in this film). You know it's the not-so distant future by the unorthodox way old-timey televisions are employed.

Since television in the not-so distant future, especially the dystopian variety, is reserved for the wealthy elites of society, the rest of humanity have managed to come up with alternative ways to utilize them. And the most common way is to display them as decorative pieces for their home or hovel. The best way, I've found, anyway, is to combine the television set with the body of a mannequin. (You mean like Prince Robot IV in Saga?) Yeah, kinda like that.

(Didn't you love it when gay porn flashed on his screen/face after he was wounded in battle?) Yes! That was one of the coolest things ever. Oh, I'm sorry. As most of you know, but just in case some of you don't, Prince Robot IV has an old-timey television set for a head, as do, I'm guessing, the majority of blue bloods who live in The Robot Kingdom, and... yeah.

Anyway, when I saw that the headquarters of the Rollerboys was decorated with television sets attached to mannequin bodies, I knew I was wallowing in the not-so distant future. And now that I've established that this film does in fact take place in the not-so distant future (pats self on the back), I think I'm going to use next paragraph to openly opine about how Corey Haim reminded me of Justin Bieber.

I'll admit, thinking about Justin Bieber was the last thing I wanted to do while watching a pretty kick ass action flick with sci-fi overtones. But I couldn't help it. The similarities were downright eerie. Is it okay if I move onto another subject, like, say, the sound Patricia Arquette's red panties made as they swooshed past her black stocking-ensnared thighs? 'Cause I don't feel comfortable talking about this. What's that? Write one more sentence? Fine. Um, let me see... Okay, I got one. The similarities between the two don't just apply to looks, as I bet the Biebs, much like Corey Haim's character, is pressured on a daily basis to become a member of an all-male gang of rollerblading white supremacists.

Ugh, I'm glad that's over. It's not that I'm above writing about Justin Bieber, it's just that I don't like polluting my little corner of the virtual universe with something that is so aggressively lame.

Opening with the sight of Corey Haim's Griffen, a.k.a. Ramrod (this film, by the way, is my first real Corey Haim experience since I saw Lucas back when I was a gothed up Winona Ryder fanatic) rollerblading in a white tank-top, you would think it was just another average day in 1990. But you're wrong, it's... (Yeah, yeah, it's the not-so distant future. We got it.) What I was going to say, before I was rudely interrupted, was that, yes, it's the not-so distant future, but get this, the United States of America is bankrupt.

According to a speech being broadcast over the airways via a pirate satellite by Gary Lee (Christopher Collett), the leader of the Rollerboys, a paramilitary group of disaffected teenagers, there was a "great crash" that basically left America in financial ruin. Blaming "alien races" for the nation's downfall, Gary Lee hopes to inspire a new generation by assembling a white army of rollerblading patriots.

When Gary Lee holds his fists up and does the official Rollerboy salute after his speech, did anyone else think of Darryl Kromm from Strange Advance as he appeared in their video for "She Controls Me"? Oh, c'mon, it couldn't have been just me. Are you serious? Whatever, man.

After finding a used coffee maker while out dumpster-diving, Milton (Devin Clark), Ramrod's younger brother, spots Casey (Patricia Arquette) while trying to hawk the appliance at a local market. Anyone care to guess what the first words out of his mouth are when he spots her? He says, "Whoa." If you think that's a bit much. Let me tell ya, if you saw the way Patricia Arquette looks throughout this movie, you would say whoa too.

Wearing a sailor hat(!), a leopard-print jacket(!), an orange belt, sunglasses, a black skirt, and black nylons, Patricia Arquette's first ensemble had me literally bouncing off the walls. I mean, her outfit was so fucking fierce. Think about it. She's wearing a sailor hat with a leopard-print jacket. Ahhh!!!! And it keeps getting better.

We see the same outfit in the next scene, as Casey stops by the house that belongs to Speedbagger (Julius Harris) to get her roller-blades fixed (it would seem that everyone roller-blades in this version of the not-so distant future, and that Speedbagger fixes roller-blades). Since most white people live in "Municipal Homeless Centers," Speedbagger allows Ramrod and Milton to pitch a tent on his front lawn, and that's how Ramrod sort of meets Casey (they didn't actually talk, they just made goo-goo eyes at one another).

You can't really blame Casey for assuming Ramrod's a Rollerboy (as the film's opening proved, he's an excellent skater). But he's not a Rollerboy. He is, however, a pizza boy, and, in the next scene, we see him delivering a pizza (in an armored van) to one of those homeless centers I mentioned earlier; not to the homeless, mind you (they can't afford pizza), but to the guards guarding them - they're kind of like prison camps.

I liked it when Ramrod consults the "dash map" (a sort of GPS system) to find the homeless center. Oh, and given that the homeless center is called "No. 87 Municipal Homeless Center," I'm going to go ahead and assume they're must be a lot of them.

Rescuing a Rollerboy–get this–named Bullwinkle (Morgan Weisser) from a burning building using his pizza van, Ramrod suddenly finds himself in the good graces of the Rollerboys' leader, who apparently lived next-door to Ramrod when they were kids.

In order to not cause any further confusion, the only character in the film who calls Griffin by the name "Ramrod" is Jaworsky (J.C. Quinn), a police detective. And since I prefer the name "Ramrod" that's what I've chosen to call him in this movie review. So, if there's anyone out there wondering why I keep calling Corey Haim's character "Ramrod," that's the reason.

While practicing his rollerblading moves in a parking garage with Milton, Gary Lee and the Rollerboys, including Bullwinkle and Bango (Mark Pellegrino, I love this guy), come skating towards them in unison. The sight of the Rollerboys skating in unison is somewhat comical yet awe-inspiring at the same time (their white coats flowing in the wind... so awesome, so cheesy). At any rate, Gary Lee tells Ramrod that if he should ever need anything that he shouldn't hesitate to ask. Oh-oh.

Flouting society's conventions at every turn, we see Patricia Arquette's Casey wearing a bra as a top in the next scene. I know, a bra as a top. (So, what else was she wearing?) Didn't you hear what I just said? She's wearing a bra as a top! It's lewd, lascivious, salacious, and, to be perfectly honest, outrageous!

With American colleges literally moving overseas (Harvard is now located in Japan), what's a teenage juvenile delinquent with great hair to do? Attend a raucous party being thrown by the Rollerboys, that's what. I'm not the biggest Nine Inch Nails fan in the world, but even I have to admit the sight of Corey Haim strutting through the crowd to the strains of "Head Like A Hole" was pretty bad-ass.

A hedonistic free-for-all for the ages, the Rollerboy party has everything: Balloons... (Funny-shaped balloons?) Well, no, unless round is funny. Now, where was I? Oh, yeah, the Rollerboy party. It has female mud wrestling, chicks dressed as mermaids, a working merry-go-round, and leggy babes in black pantyhose. See what I mean, everything.

Running into Casey, who is wearing a white ruffled collar, a white tutu, black opera gloves and a black bowler hat, Ramrod takes her outside to "chat." After making out for a few seconds, Ramrod proceeds to remove Casey's red panties. Reaching down towards the area where her red panties are currently housed, Ramrod slowly hikes them down. In order to help facilitate Ramrod's attempt to peel off her red panties, Casey lifts one of her legs up to allow for greater hiking leverage.

As her red panties go swooshing past her black stocking-ensnared thighs and calves (which, by the way, is the best sound ever), Ramrod hands the red panties to Casey and walks away. What just happened? Oh, I know what's going on. Ramrod thinks Casey wants to have sex with him just so he'll hook her up with some mist.

What's mist? It's the drug of choice in the not-so distant future. And guess who controls the distribution of mist in the not-so distant future? That's right, the Rollerboys.

Little does Ramrod know, but Casey is an undercover cop. Soon, however, Ramrod finds himself working for the police, too. But he's not going undercover out of some sort of misguided civic pride, he wants to prevent his little brother becoming a Rollerboy ("Once in, never out," is the Rollerboy motto). To make matters worse, his little brother has started misting.

Already a legend as far as I'm concerned, costume designer Merilyn Murray-Walsh manages to top herself when she unveils Patricia Arquette's orange and black cowgirl outfit. Hell, even the denizens of the not-so distant future can't help but do a double-take when they see Patricia Arquette walking down the street in her crazy cowgirl get-up.

It's a good thing Patricia Arquette's Casey was such a fashion risk taker, as the film's lack of female characters was a tad depressing (she's the only woman with a speaking part). But then again, the film more than makes up for it in other ways. How so, you say? Um, the film's about a gang of rollerblading racists who wear white winter coats. Nuff said. Day of the rope! Day of the rope! Day of the rope! The Future is ours!