Hollywood Dreams and Nightmares: The Robert Englund Story is a documentary that tracks Robert Englund’s journey through the entertainment industry from his childhood to the present. It was directed by Christopher Griffiths and Gary Smart. It was written by Gary Smart and Neil Morris. If you are curious as to what it means to be a writer for a documentary like this, it is often a credit given to one who helps create the structure of the documentary.

A lot of the information in Hollywood Dreams and Nightmares: The Robert Englund Story is presented by Robert Englund himself. This is easily the best thing it has going for it. Robert Englund is charismatic, charming, informative, and a grade-A storyteller from beginning to end. There are many other personalities from the entertainment industry and the horror genre who make appearances and share their experiences as well. If you’ve watched more than a few horror documentaries recently, you will recognize a number of them. There are also people here who you probably haven’t seen. There is an element in play sort of like “Six Degrees of Robert Englund.” That reference is a bit 90’s, so for clarity’s sake, I mean to say that Robert Englund is connected to a surprising amount of people.

Here are the differences between Hollywood Dreams and Nightmares: The Robert Englund Story and Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy. Hollywood Dreams and Nightmares is more centered on Robert Englund than A Nightmare on Elm Street, but it is also broader in scope. It involves more people from outside A Nightmare on Elm Street. It tackles the entertainment industry during different periods, and how changes in the industry and pop culture affected Robert Englund’s career path. It does talk about the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise. Hollywood Dreams and Nightmares is a little more than two hours long, and I would say a little less than a third of it is dedicated to A Nightmare on Elm Street. I think that is a perfectly healthy amount. There is a good chunk I was interested in dedicated to Robert Englund’s time as a character actor. The latter half spotlights plenty of films in Robert Englund’s catalog that don’t get too much attention.

The editing is good. The narrations and interviews aren’t all filmed in one sitting, nor are they all taken from one source, but everything flows naturally. Now and then it breaks up the talking heads with something a little fun, something a little more visually interesting, and it paces these moments out very well.

I learned a great deal from Hollywood Dreams and Nightmares: The Robert Englund Story. The things that are and the things that could have been because of Robert Englund are bewildering to me. I learned about so many films I’ve never heard of that I now need to look into, and I have obtained a whole new appreciation for some of the films I have already seen. I came out of this whole experience feeling happy, positive, and satisfied. If you are a fan of Robert Englund you might think you couldn’t possibly love the man more than you already do. You can, and if you watch this documentary, I think you absolutely will.