Scout Taylor-Compton & Rooney Mara: Two Great Scream Queens That Admirably Filled Some Big Shoes!

Jamie Lee Curtis & Heather Langenkamp are tough acts to follow, but Scout Taylor Compton & Rooney Mara definitely did a great job filling those shoes they left behind! 

For those of you who haven't seen the movies for which I am talking about, I am talking about the remakes to, Halloween (1978) and, A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984)... And for those of you who have seen these movies... As for Rooney Mara and her role in, A Nightmare On Elm Street... I will get in to that in a minute... 

Now before I go on, let me say this, Jamie Lee Curtis (The Fog) & Heather Langenkamp (Shocker) are two actresses that did totally amazing jobs in the roles that they played... I mean Heather Langenkamp's girl next door who ends having to fight against an entity that only appears to exist in dreams... And Jamie Lee Curtis's role from regular high school student to having to fight against a brutal and sadistic killer who has targeted her and is killing off her friends is sheer brilliance, (Jamie Lee Curtis played, 'Laurie Strode' in the original, 'Halloween' and Heather Langenkamp played, 'Nancy Thompson' in the original, 'A Nightmare On Elm Street'...)

Jamie Lee Curtis as, 'Laurie Strode' in one of the most famous scene in horror movie history! 

 With that said though, I will say this, Scout Taylor-Compton (who plays, 'Laurie Strode' in Rob Zombie's Halloween remake series,) delivered a truly inspiring job taking over the role... 

Now Taylor-Compton's, 'Laurie Strode' is different from Jamie Lee Curtis's, 'Laurie Strode' in a lot of ways (a great example is, Scout Taylor-Compton's more, 'sarcastic' Laurie Strode as opposed to Jamie Lee Curtis's more, 'girl next door' type of Laurie Strode... Both are good,  but one of the reasons that Scout Taylor-Compton's Laurie Strode is so good is the differences between the two...) 

She may not be, 'The Girl Next Door', but this Laurie Strode definitely has some chops!

Another reason why she did so good taking over the role, is the fact that she really made the role her own, and her progression from sarcastic teenage girl, to traumatized teen (as seen in part 2), is just sheer brilliance... And a little scary, due to the fact that you could almost see that as how she would descend in to total madness if Ms. Taylor-Compton was really going through it! 

And now on to Rooney Mara... Before I continue... A Nightmare On Elm Street (2010) was not a great movie... But Rooney Mara for me was one of those few shining lights in the movie that really helped make sure that the movie did not totally suck! 

And what I mean by this is the fact that Rooney Mara (who took over the role of: 'Nancy' from Heather Langenkamp,) really did this role justice, by really only emulating Ms. Langenkamp's strength that she gave, 'Nancy' in the original movie... 

Rooney Mara in a modern version of one of the most famous scenes in, 'A Nightmare On Elm Street'! 

Other then that... She really made the role her own, and really just brought this character to life in a new and different, and exciting way! 

For more information on these movies and the differences between the original actresses, and the people that filled in the roles that the original actresses made legendary, and did a pretty damn good job doing so... Please see these trailers for: Halloween (1978) & A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984), as well as: Halloween (2007)  & A Nightmare On Elm Street (2010)! 

Tweet

A Nightmare On Elm Street (2010) - Movie Review

Official Score = 1 1/2 Devils

Besides the Aliens franchise, one of the earliest horror movies that I can ever remember watching is, A Nightmare On Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987)…

I remember at the time that this movie which had a young Patricia Arquette (True Romance) in it, both scared the hell out of me, and also entertained me as well, part of the reason for this obviously was Freddy Krueger (whom at that time was still being played by Robert Englund).

Now at this time Freddy Kruger was really coming in to his own as a trickster who stalked his upcoming victims in their dreams before he killed them! I also found that I liked the dynamic (and the differences) of the team that would work to defeat Freddy as well (including, a jerk, a geek, a loner strong man, a tough girl, a true believer, and the sceptic… to name a few).

Unfortunately this dynamic would begin to fade in the, ‘Nightmare On Elm Street’ series as the sequels went on, but at this time it was still strong, and in some cases this particular film would help to create an interest in the series as a whole, and is part and parcel the reason why I was glad to see the remake to the classic original series recently!

As a stand alone it is pretty good, as a remake... meh...

Written by: Wesley Strick (Cape Fear), Eric Heisserer (The Thing) and Directed by: Samuel Bayer (Green Day: Bullet In A Bible). Starring: Rooney Mara (The Social Network), Jackie Earle Haley (Watchmen), Kyle Gallner (Red State), Katie Cassidy (Kill For Me), Thomas Dekker (The Good Lie) and Clancy Brown (Starship Troopers).

This movie is a re-imagining of the story that we have all grown up to enjoy and get frightened at, you see, a whole bunch of teenagers who become friends at their local High School, start one by one getting terrorized in their dreams by a hideous man in a striped sweater and hat, who is also wearing a glove, that calls himself, ‘Freddy’ (Jackie Early Haley)…

And as these friends start to die off one by one, it will be up to these kids to discover what is going on, and in the process discover a secret that binds these kids together before they thought they had ever met!

Freddy Krueger is about to destroy his first set of kids!

Now all in all, in reviews that I have read and people that I have talked to who have seen this movie, all and all, one for one, each one of them have had very negative comments to make about this movie… And I have to admit that I think that characterization of this movie is kind of fair, but mostly biased…

The truth is, is that this movie is not a horrible movie as a stand alone film… (what I mean by stand alone film, is that if this movie was not a remake, it would not have been that bad.) Of course in the end though, this movie is very paint by numbers and does not have all that much originality to it… Which as a stand alone is kind of bland, but as long as it is a good paint by numbers (like this one is), it is palatable… But as a remake of a classic horror franchise, just straight up sucks!

In the end, this movie is not a horrible, but it could have been better, and if you are looking to watch this movie for the sake of watching it and not expecting some huge fanfare… Then you might enjoy it, otherwise I would not recommend checking this one out.