RELEASE DATE: 2003
RATED: R
REVIEWED BY: The DarkSider - 2/21/2008
Our film starts out with Freddy telling his life story in a two minute interlude. I imagine most people reading this will know his tale...a burnt up child killer turned dream demon, or at least I think that is the official title on his resume. Freddy as always is played by Robert Englund who continues to make Freddy a likeable guy. I'm a big fan of Englund seeing he has saved many of bad NOES sequels from totally sucking. That and the guy truly brings a bit of a Shakespearean flair to awful movies.
Anyhow, according to this film Freddy can no longer exist because the kids on Elm Street have forgotten him. He needs someone to remind them of his presence in the dream world. So I guess I should stop here to explore this angle. I believe in the first NOES, the kids kind of started having dreams about him out of nowhere. I don't think they technically knew of him and neither did several of the kids he offs throughout the NOES series. That would make him a bit like Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy if you think about it right? So right away, my inner nerd is crying out "wait a god*mn minute" before the opening credits. Oh well, at least it's a better angle for his resurrection than a dog urinating on his grave in NOES 4.
As mentioned in the prior paragraph, Freddy needs a special someone to help him in his conquest. He combs the depths of hell and finds Mr. Voorhees. He gives the corpse a bit of a nightmare in which Freddy plays his dead mother, on of my all time film villains I might add. He tells Jason to resurrect and go on a killing spree thus making them remember Freddy. Um...uh...I guess that makes sense. Jason proceeds to rise from the grave thus contradicting his fiery crash to earth in Jason X. Who knows, maybe he had enough velocity to go six feet in the ground upon impact.
Cut to a local party on Elm Street where there are a bunch of teen girls, all with breast implants, hanging out. Lets start with the people you know are going to make it past the halfway point. There is Lori who is lamenting over an ex-boyfriend and her buddy Kia played Kelly Rowland, better known as one of the other non-Beyonce girls from Destiny's Child. Moving on to the fodder, there is a chick there named Gibb who is played by Katharine "Ginger Snaps" Isabelle and immediately she hooks up with her prickish boyfriend. Hmmmm...prick boyfriend, I wonder who goes first. Well after a bit of a sexual encounter, Jason arrives and makes a virtual mess of him.
Anyhow, lucky for the teens Deputy Scott Stubbs in near by and calls the crime in to headquarters. Other cops arrive and in the land of convenient-ville, one of them mentions the house where Freddy once lived. The commanding officer tells him to shut up and brushes it off when Stubbs asks about it. Lori overhears this and later has a dream at the police station. In it, she finds an eyeless girl who warns her of Freddy's return. That and she comes across the creepy singing kids doing the jump rope thing.
Um...I should stop here and ask, is that all she really needed to "remember" Freddy? I mean, I didn't see anyone explaining Krueger to her. If someone mentioned Rip Taylor to you, would he appear in your dream that night throwing confetti? Moving on, another kid named Blake at the party goes home and has an argument with his father. He nods off for a bit and comes face to face with Freddy. Freddy tries to kill him but finds he is still too weak. Blake awakes to find his father mutilated by Jason and quickly finds himself like father like son.
Cut to the local halfway house where two young men named Will and Mark notice a news report about the night's incident on Elm Street. Apparently Will was connected to Lori at one time and Mark has dreams about Freddy. Hmmm..imagine that...anyhow, the guys break out of the asylum and head out to catch up with the kids on Elm Street.
The boys bail the high school while Lori gets shipped off to the doctor's office. Kia almost gets messed with by Freddy but alas, not killed. Later that day, all the kids decide to have a kegger in the middle of a cornfield. I have to admit I was worried that Issac and Malachai would make a cameo at this point but luckily they didn't. Lori meets up with her normal buddies plus Will and Linderman. Meanwhile, Gibb passes out from being drunk and finds herself in a dream with Freddy. Freddy almost kills her but she disappears from the dream when Jason kills her in real life. This really bugs Freddy because Jason is stealing all his fun. Freddy laments in a Will Shatner "Khaaaaaaan" fashion.
Predictable results happen when Jason goes on a rampage and hacks the beer fest up. Will, Lori, Kia, Linderman and a Jay (from Jay and Silent Bob) rip off all hope into a van and split. Will tells Lori on the way home that he witnessed her father kill her mother and her father was the reason why he was committed. Hmmm...that's a relationship strainer there. They decide to hook up with Mark again who we join mid nightmare. Freddy finally gets into the action and leaves a message carved on his back that says, "Freddy's Back".
Back at the incompetent local law enforcement station, Stubbs mentions to the Sheriff that he has done research on the killings. Stubbs claims the Camp Crystal lake murders are being copied but the Sheriff tells him to shut up in so many words. The Sheriff tells him its another killer and refuses to say Freddy's name. I don't know why but I started comparing Freddy to Lord Voldermort at this point.
Meanwhile, the remaining kids join up for a conference and Stubbs joins them. He tells them about Jason and somehow Will guesses Freddy's plot to use Jason. I'm assuming he read the script or something. Lori dozes off during the meeting and has a brief nightmare. She somehow yanks Freddy's ear off and takes it back into the real world. A discussion of dreams happen and Will mentions a drug called Hypnosil that prevents bad dreams. The group gear up and head back to the asylum for the drug in the battle against Freddy.
Once at the asylum the group set out for the drug while Jay-clone passes out from a joint. Freddy has him disperse the drugs down the sink and with that, Jason arrives again. Stubbs gets taken out quite easily while Jay-clone, still under Freddy.s command, pumps Jason full of sedative in a suicide mission. Jason goes nighty night and proceeds to have his corpse ass kicked by Freddy all over his boiler room. The battle goes back and forth until Freddy discovers that water is Jason.s weakness. Hmmm...and all this time I thought it was Corey Feldman..
While this nonsense goes on, Freddy messes with a comatose Jason in the dream. In a sequence I found rather cool, Lori sees Jason's death as a deformed boy years ago at Camp Crystal Lake. Freddy tries drowning Jason and almost succeeds. However in a bit of plot idiocy, Kia gives Jason mouth to mouth in real life to save him. This revives Jason who ends up causing the kid's van to crash.
However, Lori still finds herself stuck in her dream. In it she learns Freddy actually killed her mother but her father covered it up. All this goes on for a bit and we keep joining up with the remaining teens who luckily figure out they are at Camp Crystal Lake. Ok, I should say now my suspension of disbelief is being sorely tested. Jason tracks down the kids and knocks over some gasoline (why is there always a can laying around in horror movies) thus causing a fire. Linderman gets mortally wounded in a scuffle and luckily Lori is able to pull Freddy out of her dream when she burns her hand in real life.
This kicks off another battle between the film's titans which sees Freddy getting the worst of it. However, Freddy makes a brief escape and catches up with Lori, Will and Kia. Kia then goes into an overabundance of annoying thus trash talking Freddy about his outfit and weapon of choice. Then Jason thankfully offs her 50 feet into a tree. I couldn't have cheered louder at this point.
So the boys battle a bit more and it gets really bloody. I had to wonder how a couple of dead guys could produce so much of the red ruby. They battle onto a dock and Lori douses it with gasoline. This causes a huge explosion but after it Freddy surfaces with Jason's machete. However, Jason gets in a last jab on Freddy using Freddy's weapon of choice (Jason had previously ripped off Freddy's glove arm). Lori lops Freddy's head off and tosses Jason's machete back into the lake. The film ends with Jason walking out of the lake holding Freddy's head, however Freddy winks which proves the battle null and void. Much like several plot points in the movie.
I have to admit I was thrilled about this film when I first heard about it. I've always loved Freddy and Jason has this cute boyish charm to him. Well, cute in a homicidal corpse way. I went out and bought on DVD and I think I really enjoyed it more the first time around than this viewing.
Granted, the film is in no way a piece of tripe. Matter of fact its quite enjoyable watching both monsters battle it out and their carnage is legendary. However, parts of me were calling for more carnage and more of a focus on the two battling their differences out. In other words, perhaps a bit too much time was spent on establishing human character back story. Oddly I had the same feeling watching Alien Vs. Predator.
Well this battle is over but there are many more brewing across the bad movie community. Click on the banner below for front row seats.
1.) Both monsters had one sequel too many by the time of this film invention.
2.) Both monsters at some point were resurrected many times in an idiotic fashion.
3.) Both monsters have killed famous actors appearing in roles I'm sure they'd like to forget.
4.) Both monsters had rather bad heavy metal songs written for them.
5.) Both monsters had ridiculously priced Halloween costumes in the mid 80s.
Well, the list goes on and on but I think you get the point....
