A Nightmare On Elm Street, Unbound

Happy Halloween, everybody!  ...Okay, I'm a little late.  But I'm here today with the spooky season's ultimate release, quite possibly the best and most exciting release of the whole year: Warner Bros new 4k UHD restoration of Wes Craven's 80's horror classic, A Nightmare On Elm Street.  Not only have we been waiting for an upgrade to Warner Bros' admittedly not so bad blu-ray for a long time, and we're finally getting it restored in 4k on a proper UHD disc, but it turns out Warners has been sitting on the "lost" uncut version all these years, and they're finally giving it to us.

A Nightmare On Elm Street was originally released on DVD back in 1999 as a part of 'The Nightmare on Elm Street Collection' with the first seven films in the series.  It got its first solo DVD in 2001 as both a full and widescreen version.  As a proud laserdisc owner, however, I didn't bother with a DVD until New Line came out with their fancier, 2006 Infinifilm 2-disc special edition.  It's been included in plenty of box sets and collections, but the next important upgrade was in 2010, when Warners upgraded the film to blu.  That blu has also been reissued in plenty of boxed sets and collections, but there hasn't been another upgrade until now, with Warner Bros' new 4k restoration on UHD.

a splash only seen in the uncut version.

Importantly, Warner's new UHD finally gives us the uncut version of the film for nearly the very first time.  One or early foreign releases, like a German VHS tape, apparently had the uncut footage as well.  But for most of us, this will be a new, complete cut with trims the MPAA forced Craven to make in order to receive an R rating restored.  You can hear him talk about it in his commentaries; he wasn't happy to do it.  It's a matter of seconds, though, so don't expect whole new effects sequences or anything.  Basically, Tina's death scene is bloodier, and there's also a tiny bit more of the infamous geyser of blood scene.  But it's still huge, getting one of the decades most important horror films finally in its complete form.

Warner's new release includes the theatrical cut, too; and one thing you might find surprising is that it's actually slightly shorter than the previous editions.  That's not just a studio logo thing or anything; it genuinely is a slightly shorter cut.  That's because previous home video releases, including the DVD and BD we'll be looking at in this comparison, aren't the original theatrical cut but a (very) slightly extended cut, bringing them closer to the original, uncut version.  I remember being amused that my Elite laserdisc had extra frames of the blood geyser.  For me, it's all academic, because I'm never going to watch anything but the uncut version from now on.  But yes, in giving us an accurate theatrical version, that one's actually slightly shorter (it's also got a brief trim in the final shot of the jump rope girls) than previous releases.  It's basically a historical artifact that they've thrown in alongside the uncut version.

1) 2006 New Line DVD; 2) 2010 Warner Bros BD; 3) 2024 Warmer Bros UHD.

So let's look at these.  Warner Bros has always done a good job with this film, so none of these versions look drastically different.  Even the DVD is anamorphic, and the color timing and everything is virtually the same.  The framing and aspect ratio shifts ever so slightly, from 1.83:1 on the DVD to a typically (for Warner Bros) unmatted 1.78:1 BD and a now perfect 1.85:1 UHD.  The colors are strongest, unsurprisingly, on the UHD and there's a distinct boost in resolution with each generation.  The DVD has your typical SD blur, and while grain now appears on the BD, it's a messy.  The UHD finally clears everything up.  Grain appears a bit soft, but the image is so much clearer and refined now.  A great and easy way to confirm this for yourself is to check out the notice board in the second set of shots.  You can always read the headlines, like "MISSING! Kevin Collins," but on the BD, you can just barely make out the "Kevin Collins Hotline," and on the UHD you can finally make out the smallest font, including that he's "10 years old" and "LAST SEEN FEB 10."  Guys, we're finally cracking down on the Elm St Kevin Collins mystery!

Every release here basically gives us the choice of the mono track and a remix.  There's both 5.1 and 6.1 on the DVD, 7.1 on the BD (and now they're lossless DTS-HD) and Atmos on the UHD.  Every release also includes optional English subtitles (some online sources, like DVDCompare, say the DVD doesn't have any, but I'm running them right now.  They play in ALL CAPS, but they're definitely on the disc) and a bunch of foreign language options.

some exciting offers included with the 2006 DVD.

So we've always had a nice package of extras with this film, and the contents don't really change across releases.  We get two audio commentaries: an excellent one from the laserdisc by Craven joined by Heather Langencamp, John Saxon and director of photography Jacques Haitkinand, and another one that's essentially a collection of interview snippets with all the major cast and crew edited into one big audio track.  Both are very worth your time.  Then there's a roughly hour-long documentary, which is also pretty excellent, a featurette on New Line Cinema and a silly one about the nature of dreams,   You can skip that last one, but don't miss the main doc, which is full of outtakes, deleted scenes and great interviews.  You also get the alternate endings, the trailer, and a collection "Focus Points," which are about 20 minutes worth of outtakes and clips, most of which were also in the doc.  Both the DVD and UHD come in natty slipcovers, and there are various alternative packaging options like steelbooks and even swaggier sets.

I suppose it could feel a little disappointing that they didn't cook up any new extras for this latest release, but there's really not much more to ask for from the existing package.  Do we really need another interview asking the same people for the same anecdotes?  And if you do need more, let me remind you, the Never Sleep Again blu-ray is right there.  And the fact that you can get this new, ultimate edition of one of the all time great horror movies on a straight-forward single-disc edition that still has all the trimmings for $23 while the boutiques keep inflating their prices for releases that aren't remotely as worthy (like, sorry, Synapse wants how much for Trick Or Treat?)?  There's no question, this is an absolute must.