Before getting into this particular film, I feel like I need to give some background context for myself, as this is a documentary centred on a film I have some history with. A Nightmare On Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge is one of the first movies I ever reviewed. Back when I was still trying to make YouTube my career, I chose this as my second review subject. My take on it was… rough. It was done back when I was still well-ingrained in the ‘angry critic’ style that was big at the time, and honestly, looking back at my strained attempts to discuss the gay aspects of the film make me cringe so hard that, at some point, I actually took it down from my YouTube channel.
It was a snapshot of me at a time when I was still in high school, still struggling to figure out where I fit into this bigger film culture I had become enamoured with, and still convinced that I was straight. I do stand by a lot of my misgivings with the film, like how the horror elements didn’t work for me, how much it paled in comparison to the first Elm Street (and, quite frankly, to what would come after it) just as a slasher flick, and how much the ending seriously annoyed me (take your pick on what is worse: The gay movie with the straightest ending possible, or Freddy Krueger being defeated by true love’s kiss), but I get the feeling that I’m due for a rewatch after 8 or 9 years since making that video. Especially after seeing this documentary about its lead star, Mark Patton.
This is as much a depiction of Mark Patton’s tumultuous experience in Hollywood as it is a look at queer film theory as a whole, particularly when it comes to horror movies. There’s something about horror that is able to really tap into a person’s sense of identity, usually when that identity is on the margins of what can charitably be called ‘normal’, and we get quite a lot of that here. It’s basically a big showing of what I always try and advocate for with films (namely, how being able to see yourself in a cinematic story can be a very powerful experience), showing LGBT men and women declare their love for Freddy’s Revenge and how, at the time it came out, it gave them a sense of comfort that they didn’t find anywhere else.
And speaking of the time when it came out, the historical context here is staggering. Juxtaposing Mark Patton’s career as a closeted gay actor with how fear-driven a lot of the discussion surrounding the AIDS epidemic was (and, in certain places, still is), it gives a vivid first-person account of what it was like trying to exist (let alone thrive in the arts) during all of this. From how much his agent was trying to turn him into a ‘character actor’ because he couldn’t play straight, to him dealing with his lover also having contracted HIV at the time, to how the social and political climate essentially roadblocked his career and he went into reclusion until being tapped for Never Sleep Again, a documentary about the Elm Street series.
It’s quite engaging viewing, and certainly gives me a lot of context about the film itself that I definitely didn’t have the first time around… but then we get into Mark’s own damage surrounding the production. Namely, writer David Chaskin and how Mark felt he was thrown under the bus once the gay subtext became more of a talking point. Reading and later hearing a quote from Chaskin about how the homosexual content was written more to be homophobic than homoerotic (which may or may not be a case of Schrodinger’s Douchebag on Chaskin’s part) honestly made a lot more sense out of my own misgivings with Freddy’s Revenge, as it did come across like a gay film made through a primarily straight lens that cuts into the fun of it somewhat.
But more than that, the film’s main depiction of Mark is shown at its clearest and most heartbreaking when it’s put next to Chaskin: The promising young actor who was terrified of being who he truly was, at a time when everyone from the media to the White House quite literally wanted his blood. And through the film’s framing (aided by some terrific narration from Cecil Baldwin of Welcome To Night Vale fame), its main progression is giving Mark a chance for closure about all that. About the guy he held up for so long as the embodiment of the crap he experienced. It’s quite a cathartic moment when they finally talk one-on-one, and when wrapped around so much clear-eyed love for the genre and the people it stands up for, it’s difficult not to get emotional just thinking about this thing after the fact.
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