“Where does the dream finish, and reality begin?” At times, we’ve all had trouble distinguishing a nightmare from reality. Join this episode’s Grue Crew - Whitney Collazo, Chad Hunt, and Jeff Mohr - as they struggle to discover exactly what is real in Nightmare from Hammer.
Decades of Horror: The Classic Era
Episode 56 – Nightmare (1964)
Janet is a young student at a private school; her nights are troubled by horrible dreams in which she sees her mother, who is in fact locked in an insane asylum, haunting her. Expelled because of her persistent nightmares, Janet is sent home, where the nightmares continue.
IMDb
Hammer Films didn’t only focus on classic Frankenstein, Dracula, or Mummy films. They also produced a number of very good, psychological horror features and Nightmare is an excellent example. With Hammer regulars, Freddie Francis and Jimmy Sangster at the helm, how could they go wrong?
Whitney identifies “betrayal” as the dominant theme in Nightmare and she really appreciated Jennie Linden’s portrayal of Janet as a vulnerable and traumatized woman questioning her own sanity. Even though he’s more of a creature feature guy, Chad found Nightmare to be an entertaining film and felt it almost seemed like two different movies. Jeff enjoyed trying to figure out what was really happening but even then, the twists surprised him. The members of your Grue Crew recommend Nightmare to fans of psychological horror or to anyone that wants to see a good example of filmmaking.
The Decades of Horror: The Classic Era Grue Crew plan to release a new episode every other week. Hey, where else will you hear podcasts on films ranging from Bride of Frankenstein (1935) to The Curse Of Frankenstein (1957) to Abbott And Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948)? The next episode in our very flexible schedule will be Toho’s The War of the Gargantuas (1966), the kind-of-a-sequel to Frankenstein Conquers the World (1965).
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To each of you from each of us, “Thank you so much for listening!”