It has been about 15 years since we last saw Freddy Kureger grace the silver screen. That moment came in 2010’s A Nightmare on Elm Street remake, which was rather successful financially. Critically speaking? That’s a conversation for another time, but Hollywood runs on money so the question remains; why haven’t we had another Elm Street movie since? The desire exists, both from the business side and from fans, yet it’s not happening. At least not right now.
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First, let’s discuss the latest development. It seems New Line Cinema, which is owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, has a desire to bring Freddy back. In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Richard Brenner, the CCO of New Line Cinema, was asked if the studio hopes to make a new A Nightmare on Elm Street movie in the future. His answer was telling and also opened up a host of questions. Per Brenner…
“We hope so. It’s complicated because of the rights.”
Given that New Line is literally known as “the house that Freddy built” because of the success of Wes Craven’s A Nightmare on Elm Street, it only seems fitting that the studio would want to keep that legacy going. Particularly in light of horror’s enduring popularity at the box office since the pandemic upended the movie business. But as Brenner mentions, the rights issues are getting in the way.
Back in 2019, the domestic rights to A Nightmare on Elm Street reverted back to Craven’s estate. Rather crucially, New Line still retains the international rights to the franchise, as copyright law varies from country to country. It’s complicated. That’s a big reason why we haven’t had a new Friday the 13th movie since 2009. Essentially, Craven’s estate would need to find a U.S. distributor and then make a deal with New Line for the international release. New Line could, in theory, cut a deal for the U.S. release as well, but that ball is in the court of Craven’s estate.
For what it’s worth, Bloody Disgusting reported in November 2019 that Craven’s estate was taking pitches for a new Nightmare on Elm Street movie. Unfortunately, nothing ever came of it, so far as we know. What we do know is that Blumhouse had tremendous success with the recent Halloween trilogy. One imagines Jason Blum would love to get his hands on Freddy Krueger, provided the chance. He’s certainly not alone.
What we know for sure is that any Elm Street movie moving forward would need to be a reboot of some kind. Robert Englund has ruled out playing Freddy again as he’s aged out of the role. Englund played the role for nearly 20 years on screen from 1984 to 2003 in Freddy vs. Jason. The actor did appear in an episode of The Goldbergs in full makeup, but that was a handful of years ago.
The desire is there on both sides. Warner Bros. recently released A Nightmare on Elm Street on 4K, indicating there’s money to be made. That’s not surprising. Who knows? Money talks and it seems inevitable that the various players will come together to get a movie going at some point. Unfortunately, for the time being, there are no definitive plans though.
For more, get the lowdown on another big horror franchise, namely what’s going on with Saw XI.
