Fear Street: 1994 (Netflix) Movie Review & Comments

Surprisingly negative review, this is sitting on a Rotten Tomatoes rating of 86%.

I enjoyed it. It felt like a mixture of Scream and Stranger Things, although the 90s setting was perhaps a mis-step as let's face it, 90s music was mostly terrible. The plot was fine, mixing the slasher with a dash of creature feature, and it moved at a blistering pace. The time flew by.

Like any nostalgia themed movie it's never going to go down as a classic because by its very nature it's not forging its own path or breaking any new ground. But, it was a fun way to spend an hour and 45 minutes and I'll certainly be back next Friday for part 2. Which hopefully will have better music in it.
 
Watched it last night, Thought it was ok. No more. 6/10
 
Overly harsh review I think, it’s certainly better than most of the other Netflix Original trash! Having said that, Part 2 looks promising.
 
I'll check this out being a slasher nut.

For slasher nostalgia kicks though, everything will have to go some to beat the last season of American Horror Story. That has planted itself as the absolute pinnacle of slasher tributes.
 
5/10?
I thought it was quite refreshing and the gore was great.
I initially thought it was a scream copy then went down a different rabbit hole which I enjoyed. Easy 7/10
 
Yeah it was OK for what it is, 7/10 is fair.

Clearly spread the budget over the 3 films though and the editing is pretty poor, film jumps allover the place.
 
I watched it yesterday and was expecting to enjoy it more. Still felt like I was watching a Netflix original film (if that makes sense). Some of the gore/deaths were good fun but it didn’t really hold my attention all the way through. I’m not sure I’ll bother watching the others. Agree with 5/10.
 
You're killing me here. Garbage, Cyprus Hill, Portishead, House of Pain, Radiohead, Soundgarden. This was music's golden age! I just wish they'd stuck to one for more than 10 seconds.
"DAD! Leave the radio dial alone!"
Radiohead I'll give you. Now had it been set in the 80s they'd really have had a treasure trove of great music to draw upon.

I imagine they thought the 80s was played out, but it really was the decade of the slasher. The 90s, well there was Scream and I Know What you did Last Summer, but not a whole lot else.

I did chuckle at the weird ultra high resolution Windows 3.1 chat room apparently running on an Amiga 2000 though. Utterly bizarre.
 
Radiohead I'll give you. Now had it been set in the 80s they'd really have had a treasure trove of great music to draw upon.

I imagine they thought the 80s was played out, but it really was the decade of the slasher. The 90s, well there was Scream and I Know What you did Last Summer, but not a whole lot else.

I did chuckle at the weird ultra high resolution Windows 3.1 chat room apparently running on an Amiga 2000 though. Utterly bizarre.
It's true that when RL Stine was writing his endless volumes of sanitised horror for youngsters he was pulling from the clichés established in the twenty years prior.

I'm guessing the early 1990s setting comes from when the Fear Street books were at the height of their popularity. That was certainly true for when I read a few of them.
Also...yeah, the 80s is real played out.

Maybe I'm made of stone but stuff that trades on nostalgia is an instant turn off.
"Hey remember..." is not a replacement for world building
 
The only thing I will pick on is the garbage and prodigy songs they used weren’t even out when the film was set. Still, brilliant soundtrack none the less
 
Wow , that's one harsh score for a film that for myself hit all the right notes in slasher, gore and style stakes with a great soundtrack to boot .

The film does what it needed to do in setting up this trilogy to be explored . I'm not usually up on this genre as slasher Teen horror is not my thing . It had just enough though to hold my interest to see how this lil slasher universe expands and unfolds .

It does interest myself beyond this one film that in knowing the trilogy moves well beyond 1994.

Not gonna score it until I see how well it fits into this trilogy .
 
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I think a 6/10 is about right. It could have done with losing 10 or 15 minutes, but had a pretty strong ending/cliffhanger. I'll still be back for the sequel (next week!).
 
You're killing me here. Garbage, Cyprus Hill, Portishead, House of Pain, Radiohead, Soundgarden. This was music's golden age! I just wish they'd stuck to one for more than 10 seconds.
"DAD! Leave the radio dial alone!"
Couldn't agree more. The inclusion of those tracks added a whole extra point for me! I was in music heaven in the 90's and have never been able to let it go as decade.
 
Saw it last night and was...ok, nothing great but not awful. Needed more kills and more gore to keep me interested, not sure how it got an 18 apart from the bread slicer scene
 
No issue with the soundtrack, (although personally I'd rather they had gone for some lesser known bands rather than just do a lazy trolley dash through the obvious and rather predictable choices).
The film itself was, well - to be honest I'm struggling to remember it already.
Which given I watched it yesterday hardly points to it being another Citizen Kane.
What was the question again?
 
People are complaining about the soundtrack and there was me bopping along to the tracks from my teenage years. The film it self was bloody fantastic, not really horror fan unless it is laced with comedy or from that 90s era where you had Scream, Urban Legend, I Know What You Did and Final destination type film.

But it had all the good things from the aforementioned films and even at least one moment that made me wince and couldn't believe they did that moment. Very well paced and it starts strong and just keeps going and all the little references to part 2 and 3 that are yet to come. Really looking forward to Part 2 next week.
 
I enjoyed it.. it’s a slightly substandard Scream.. but good
 
I’m definitely invested in this trilogy
 
I wanted to like it more than I did. I can see what they were aiming for but it was too much of a rehash and less of an homage for my tastes. I would have enjoyed it if all the winks to past inspirations had been more subtle than they were.

I did like the cast though, and the overall vibe of what they're going for, so I'll watch the next two. It wasn't bad by any means, just not quite how I would have done it.
 
Fear Street 1994 Part 1 does have a horror on a budget look or was it just a clever way to make a new Netflix movie during a COVID pandemic with a minimum number of actors.
I think that most viewers who can get past the formulaic teen angst, sexual identity themes, and of course the familiar schlock seen in countless other B Grade DVD horror offerings will be mildly amused by the shameless exploitation of 'Halloween', 'You're Next', 'Evil Dead', etc.,etc. predicting whose going to die next is half the fun. Viewers will also enjoy the period music included too.
As Fear Street has a Part 2 coming Netflix probably wont worry too much about the audience viewing figures.
My rating is 6 out of 10, it may have been higher if there was something original included in the plot, but it's popcorn viewing so you cant be too picky.
Note: Netflix perhaps should have shown a warning at the start of the film about scenes depicting attempted suicide, they have done for other shows.
 

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