Tuesday, October 21, 2014

13 Phones of Halloween #3

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There were a lot of digs towards Heather Langenkamp's performance in A Nightmare on Elm Street when I propped her Nancy up against Freddy in last week's "Beauty vs Beast" and while yes, the seams certainly show, I think there's an honesty to her performance that you can't fake - she makes Nancy a real teenage girl up there. Take the way she dials the phone in this scene, holding it in front of her, stabbing the buttons with dramatic flair - only an exasperated teen girl would dial the phone this way.

She has reason for dramatic flair, of course - she's trying to save Sexy Half-Shirt's life! And the dummy fell right asleep like he said he wouldn't. Men! 

I love Glenn's parents - they're such assholes. 

"She says it's private.
Very private, and very important."

"GLENN'S ASLEEP YOU'LL HAVE TO TALK TO HIM TOMORROW."

"You've just gotta be firm with these kids, that's all."

And then Papa Half-Shirt dooms Sexy Half-Shirt...

... by taking the phone off the hook!
Dun dun dun

Again with that amazing dialing. 
But hark, the phone rings...

... unfortunately a gif doesn't get across the sound Nancy's hearing - it's Freddy Krueger's patented "knives scarping on metal" sound effect. Nancy rips the phone out of the wall...

... and throws it on her bed...
where it starts to rings on its own!

".... hello?"

"I'm your boyfriend now, Nancy."

If you grew up in the 80s (or the 70s or even into the 90s I guess) then you know what a trope the teenage girl tethered to her phone was - this scene is such a violation of that space, I love it. You're hitting the teen girls right where they live, Wes! And of course, once that cord is (literally and metaphorically) severed...


In summation: Parents, let your kids talk on the damn phone.

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