The nonexistent plot revolves around four high school classmates who have begun having nightmares about a man in a hat, and have begun seeing visions of themselves when they were very little, but don't realize that they aren't alone until one of their classmates (Kellan Lutz) kills himself. The central character in the movie is still arguably Nancy (Rooney Mara), who is now a quiet girl who works as a waitress and likes to draw, although cheerleader-type Kris (Katie Cassidy) gets infinitely more screen time in the first half. Connecting them are Kris' ex-boyfriend Jesse (Thomas Dekker), who is skeptical of the dreams' meaning, and his friend Quentin (perpetually sad-faced Kyle Gallner), who has a crush on Kris. One by one, they fall prey to a man none of them recognize, but who we know is Freddy Krueger, until the last two standing find out the truth about Freddy from their parents and have a confrontation with him.

While the hidden past that connects these five kids is eventually revealed -- and the secret has been changed greatly from the original film -- the kids' lives are otherwise not terribly important. We never find out how close Nancy is with any of the others, just that she knows them from having gone to school with them for years. The one thing they all seem to have in common is single parents -- we only ever see three parents, one per kid, in the whole movie, and one of them is the fantastic Clancy Brown. The man we get to know the most is Freddy himself, thanks to some informative dreams he provides, and despite doing the voice as a croak that verges on Dark Knight territory, Jackie Earle Haley does a great job as Freddy. He's replaced the wacky puns of the Robert Englund version with one- or two-word put-downs and a creepy, sad-sack conversational style, and he does a good job at making the killer seem like the victim, especially when the movie hints throughout that there might be reason for us to be sympathetic.

Special effects-wise, the look of the film is pretty amazing -- the old method of "you think you're awake, but you're really not" still exists, where reality takes a horrific turn, but there's also some incredible-looking moments when reality and the dream world flicker back and forth, like when a pharmacy aisle momentarily becomes a pipe-strewn passageway in Freddy's factory dream world during a series of "micronaps." (Not as fun as they sound.) Cheesy moments like Freddy's CGI face pressing out of the wallpaper can throw you out of the movie, but the simple act of Kris washing her face and looking in the mirror is misleadingly scary enough to lock you back in. Similarly, Freddy's new, less cartoonish makeup successfully makes him even more frightening, and once you factor in the new information that the movie reveals about him, you've got a disturbing new Freddy for the 2010s.

However, while the movie is mostly a great modernization, one way in which Nightmare tries to channel the movies of the early 1980s is by casting blatant twentysomethings as high school students. Sure, many of them have played high-schoolers in the recent past to certain degrees of success (Dekker in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Gallner in Jennifer's Body), but Cassidy plays a high-powered publicist on Melrose Place, and Lutz was pushing believability even before his immortal vampire character graduated in Twilight: New Moon. (At his funeral, they show what must be Lutz's actual high school photo, instead of a more recent photo, in which he looks like a professional model.) And Mara, whose Nancy is painted as an awkward outsider with no friends, is kind of like the artist girl in Not Another Teen Movie -- she's incredibly hot, but she has paint on her overalls and therefore must be a nobody who could never be prom queen. All she needs are glasses and her hair in pigtails.

What did you think of Nightmare? Get your crucifix and leave your opinions below, then check out the superstars of Elm Street's most nightmarish roles!

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