10 Movies You Wrongly Thought Were Innovators

Wes Craven liked to inject his movies with psychological and thematic elements, which is why so many of them have stuck around. A Nightmare On Elm Street is basically about the sins of the parents being inherited by their children, and stealing their innocence.

When Craven came back for New Nightmare he wanted to comment on the whole Freddy phenomenon itself, and how a vicious child killer became a lovable pop culture icon. To that end, he crafted a story where the makers of the original reunite to make another film, or the evil that inspired Freddy will break out into the real world.

New Nightmare is a total meta-commentary on filmmaking and storytelling, commenting on horror movie rules and tropes. Sadly the film wasn’t much of a hit, but Craven would find bigger success with this meta-style a few years later thanks to the Scream. The Scream series would later spawn other self-aware movies like Urban Legend, Shaun Of The Dead and even Cabin In The Woods.