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

It's refreshing to look at an early entry in this deathless series again, from back when they were still trying to make them interesting, rather than just a series of clever, convoluted kills. Part of it is that there's just enough Freddy to make this a Nightmare movie- in the small doses we see him in here, he's still a frightening boogeyman, rather than the quippy parody of same that he would become later on. I also enjoyed the effort they put into advancing the mythology of the Nightmare universe- the characters still relate somewhat to the events that started it all, and in an interesting twist, one is even able to call others into her nightmare to fend off Freddy. Watching this, I figured out what bugs me about Patricia Arquette nowadays- it's that marble-mouthed girlishness, which doesn't really wash when you're 40 years old but actually suits this role pretty well. Rating: **1/2 out of ****.