By Wes Craven, the director of horror classics A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) and Scream (1996), passed away this afternoon at age 76. Craven’s family announced that the filmmaker died in his home in Los Angeles after battling brain cancer.
Craven’s first film was the revenge movie The Last House on the Left (1972), followed in 1977 by The Hills Have Eyes. It was the inventiveness of A Nightmare on Elm Street that cemented Craven’s place in the horror canon, and made the film’s villain, Freddy Kreuger, a household name. While Craven’s later work in the 80s and early 90s was not as successful as A Nightmare on Elm Street, he would make two more notable contributions to the horror canon in the form of deconstructions: Wes Craven’s New Nightmare (1994) and Scream.
For a little while, Wes Craven’s New Nightmare was one of my favorite horror films, and it’s still my favorite movie of the Elm Street series. In some ways, New Nightmare was the movie that got me more interested in the idea of the collective unconscious and the work of Carl Jung. Who says no good can come of bad dreams?
Wes Craven’s influence is indisputable and he will be missed. Flixist sends our condolences to his family and loved ones.
[via Deadline]