Wes Craven

[knives]

He was also a very enjoyable interview presence. Always saying interesting or at least friendly things. Seemed a nice person whatever quality he had as a director.

[carmilla mircalla]

Rest In Peace. I think I'm going to watch my absolute favorite from him, Shocker in the coming days.

[colinr0380]

Wes Craven

The best thing about Craven was that he was able to reinvent himself according to the trends in horror and created some of the seminal films of the 70s, 80s and 90s, which all felt quite different from each other. From the grungy, nasty brutality of Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes (which is still my favourite of Wes Craven's films), through the visual effect laden, dreamlike, almost fairytale, shocks of Nightmare on Elm Street (but also Serpent and the Rainbow, Shocker, People Under The Stairs and Deadly Friend), to eventually the post-modern knowing take on the horror genre with Scream and its sequels, there was always that sense that Craven was ably attempting to meld horror trends with mainstream culture in a commercially successful way.

I particularly like Hills Have Eyes and the Scream films (I still love the way Craven deconstructs the family home throughout the series, until it is just a stage set in the third!). A Nightmare on Elm Street is well made (the couple of uses of the rotating room set especially) but I much prefer the complexities of Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (which Craven had a hand in) and especially Wes Craven's New Nightmare, which played around with the whole fourth-wall breaking post-modern take on horror just before Scream. New Nightmare is also interesting for its use of the 1994 Northridge earthquake that hit Los Angeles, with shots of the aftermath of that event folded into the storyline of the film. Plus it also provides us with a brief look inside the offices of New Line Cinema of the day (truly 'a studio built on the blood of Freddy Kreuger's victims!') and has that great scene in which 'Heather Langenkamp' visits with 'Wes Craven' to discuss his latest top secret project!

While Music of the Heart is getting all of the attention by the BBC for its non-horror aspects and Meryl Streep Oscar nomination (though it always struck me as a little too obvious an attempt to jump on the Dangerous Minds crossed with Mr Holland's Opus bandwagon, missing the height of the 'inspirational teachers' trend by a couple of years), I really liked the thriller Red Eye which is fantastically claustrophobic for its first two thirds before disappointingly opening out a little, before suddenly plunging into a cat and mouse game using a half-renovated house that immediately makes you aware that you are seeing a film by the maker of the Scream films! It was also a film that emphasised to me that parents often play important catalyst roles in Craven's films in the way that they spark off a lot of the problems that their children end up having to confront head on much later! (Only Last House On The Left really had the opposite take on that concept!)

[nolanoe]

This makes me terribly sad. The first of the big ones of his generation of horror auteurs to go!?

Nightmare on Elm Street is a masterpiece. Red Eye is one of the worst films I have ever seen. Last House on the Left changed film history. What is there more to want in the life of a director?
And yes, his interviews always seemed very interesting and painted a good picture of him.

[flyonthewall2983]

I loved the Red Eye trailer that shifts considerably in tone when you see his name on screen.

[Dylan]

For those interested in the troubled production of Craven's Deadly Friend, a few months ago a terrific article written by Joseph Madrey was published online that charts the project's metamorphosis from a sensitive fantasy-thriller to the illogical and tonally incoherent gorefest it ultimately became. Interviewed are author Diana Henstell, whose novel Friend the film was adapted from, and screenwriter Bruce Joel Rubin, who granted Madrey access to several drafts of the screenplay.

Meanwhile, having seen and greatly enjoyed Shatterday, Wes Craven's pilot episode of the 1980s Twilight Zone revival series (written by Harlan Ellison), upon hearing of Craven's passing I watched all of his Twilight Zone episodes, most of which I hadn't seen before. Of these, A Little Peace and Quiet and Wordplay are magnificent, definitely Craven's best work and each of them up there with the best of the original Twilight Zone series. I also recommend the surprisingly moving and sensitive episode Her Pilgrim Soul. If his Twilight Zone work is any indication of what the original version of Deadly Friend was like, there's a very good chance we lost what might have been one of the the best genre films of the mid-80s.