Comic-Con: 'A Nightmare On Elm Street' remake gets 'very serious'

Freddy Krueger from the new "A Nightmare On Elm Street" teaser poster

Credit: New Line Cinema

The makers of the upcoming "A Nightmare On Elm Street" reboot don't want you walking into the movie with the wrong expectations. For one, Freddy Krueger will be less heavy on the one-liners.

"If you're looking for just an imitation of the other actor in the other movies, then you'll be disappointed. This isn't a funny movie. I personally don't think characters wise-cracking and killing at the same time is very funny. I'm taking this very seriously," says director Samuel Bayer, who has been better known for his work with music videos. The comments came during a press conference at Comic-Con in San Diego over the weekend.

"I really do look at a movie like 'The Dark Knight' as an inspiration for this. I don't think that people dress up in outfits and fly into the sky... but Chris Nolan made me believe it. I'd like people to almost believe this could be real."

"It was important to go back and pay homage to [original Freddy Krueger] Robert Englund. It was important to have these qualities like the sweater, the hat and the glove -- but it needed to have some newness to this re-envisioning. The makeup that Andrew Clement designed is incredible," said Jackie Earle Haley, who plays the new Freddy. He also recently had his turn as Rorschach in "The Watchmen." "Where Sam and I were coming from with it was dark, more serious, less jokey. It'll hopefully be scarier, more intense."

Horror producers Andrew Form and Brad Fuller, who were also behind remakes of films like "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" and "The Amityville Horror," "jumped" at the chance of re-doing this iconic classic, mostly because it's "the strongest concept we've ever heard. When you fall asleep, you die," said Form.

"I think the most scariest stuff is when you believe in the characters, in the kids. What Jackie did is multi-dimensional. When blood happens, it's bloody," said Bayer. "But it's the dreams that will really scare you. [Dreams are] the one of the things that dates the original series. I think some of the films really did look like they were made in 1988, ike, when they go into the dreamworld its always cloudy, smokey, fog-machines... You'll see a much more 21st Century take on the dream sequences."

The directors would not reveal is Freddy doubles not only as a child murderer, but also as a child molester in this new film, though the concept has been out there since the original films. 

"A Nightmare On Elm Street" is presently scheduled for a spring 2010 release.