Wes Craven was indirectly responsible for my introduction to horror. I was nine years old, and afraid of the idea of horror movies – but I had never actually seen one. A friend of mine suggested I watch A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child, promising me it wasnt scary; it was funny. I watched, it was, and my obsession with horror was born on that day.
Craven wasnt directly involved with Elm Street 5, but without him, the Elm Street franchise wouldnt exist. After viewing Dream Child, it was all over. My appetite for horror became voracious, and I started with the rest of the Elm Street franchise. The original A Nightmare on Elm Street remains one of my favorite movies of all time, and even as a pre-teen, I kept an eye out for Wes Cravens name on a video box.
Cravens film history spans over forty years, mostly in horror. In the late 1990s, Craven tried to break away from horror with Music of the Heart, starring Meryl Streep. He wanted a change of pace, but it wasnt a fit, so he returned to horror, where he flourished.
He was working right up to his death. He had written and was about to direct a segment of WGNs upcoming Ten Commandments mini-series. A People Under the Stairs TV series was in the works, and he was a producer on MTVs Scream series and the upcoming thriller The Girl in the Photographs.
The loss of Wes Craven is a deep loss, not just for the horror community, but for the entertainment industry and film lovers. The Last House on the Left may not be for everyone, Scream and A Nightmare on Elm Street are so deeply embedded in cinematic history that I defy you to find someone who hasnt seen at least one of them.
In the gallery below, you can check out a selection of Wes Craven’s filmography.
(Photo credit: Getty Images)
Wes Craven Selected Filmography
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The Last House on the Left (1972)
Wes Craven's first feature. An exploitation masterpiece in which a gang of thugs rape, torture, and kill a couple of girls in the woods. They later take refuge in the home of one of the girls, and when her parents find out who they are, the revenge is swift and violent.
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The Hills Have Eyes (1977)
A family road trip becomes a living nightmare when their car breaks down in a remote desert area inhabited by murderous, inbred hill people.
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Deadly Blessing (1981)
Sharon Stone's first starring role, in which murder plagues a violently religious community.
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Swamp Thing (1982)
A chemical accident turns a scientist into a swampy plant monster.
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Invitation to Hell (1984)
A suburban nightmare in which a new family to the neighborhood is coerced into joining a cult.
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A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)
A child molester, killed by an angry mob of parents, kills a new generation by attacking them in their dreams.
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Deadly Friend (1986)
When a teenager is killed by her abusive, alcoholic father, her friend brings her back to life by replacing her brain with the brain of his robot.
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The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988)
An anthropologist travels to Haiti to research voodoo practices and so-called "zombie" drugs.
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Shocker (1989)
An executed serial killer uses electricity to come back to life and take revenge on those who turned him in.
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The People Under the Stairs (1991)
When a child's attempted robbery of his ruthless landlords fail, he finds he is trapped in a house of horrors owned not by a husband and wife, but by an incestuous brother and sister, and their abused children.
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Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994)
Taking meta to a whole new level, original "Elm Street" stars Heather Langenkamp and Robert Englund play themselves, being plagued by the movie villain they helped popularize. Wes Craven appears as himself, as well as writing and directing.
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Vampire in Brooklyn (1995)
A Caribbean vampire comes to Brooklyn in search of his soulmate, a woman whose father was a vampire.
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Scream (1996)
A masked slasher is on the loose, killing high school students because of - or in spite of - "horror movie rules."
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Music of the Heart (1999)
Wes Craven's only non-horror film, about a music teacher in Harlem.
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Cursed (2005)
After being attacked by a werewolf, three teens must find and kill the beast in order to avoid the same fate.
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Red Eye (2005)
A woman is kidnapped during the course of a normal plane flight, and roped into helping her captor pull off an assassination.
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My Soul to Take (2010)
A serial killer returns to town to kill the seven children who were born on the day he supposedly died.
