Everyone knew that Inception didn’t stand a chance to win Best Picture at last weekend’s Academy Awards, but the nomination felt like a bit of triumph all on its own. Here was a summer blockbuster – a tentpole studio movie – being recognized by the Academy. Despite the lack of spaceships, Inception was explicitly science fiction, which the Oscars likes to ignore, except in the technical categories. To top it off, the film was largely set in a dream.
Why is that important? Because dream movies tend to be despised and dismissed as much as they’re admired. Even though film, with its multiple points of view and a logical structure dictated by association instead of argument, is as close as we can come to reproducing the experience of a dream, people think of film dreams as indulgent or tacky, an excuse for filmmakers to cut loose and throw any old thing up on screen. It’s a shame that we carry that attitude around, because a well-done dream on film is a thing of beauty. These are the five most beautiful of the bunch.
5. Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)
Where does horror begin? Where do our monsters come from? From dreams. And our bedroom closet. Wes Craven’s genius was to blur the line between dreams and wakefulness by having a monster that attacked you in your sleep. You can run, but you can’t stay awake forever.
4. Paprika (2006)
If you like Inception but you’ve never seen this manga, you owe it to yourself to get a glimpse of what would happen if Christopher Nolan weren’t so buttoned down (if you watch the trailer, you’ll see a few shots that look suspicously Inception-y). A device allows therapists to enter the dreams of their patients, but predictably, the creepy crawlies of the subconscious refuse to stay put once the door to another mind has opened. Utterly freaky.
3. Abre los Ojos/Open Your Eyes (1997)
A Spanish thriller that was remade into the more sentimental Vanilla Sky, Open Your Eyes is the story of a young man who becomes grossly disfigured after he survives a car accident – or does he? Inexplicable events keep piling up, and as he tries to puzzle his way through it, reality itself begins to suggest that he may be trapped in a dream state. I enjoyed Vanilla Sky, but Open Your Eyes is much more taut and paranoid.
2. Living In Oblivion (1995)
My verdict is in: if you’re going to see one mid ’90s independent flick about a filmmaker trying like hell to make a movie, Living In Oblivion is it. Steve Buscemi is a frustrated director struggling mightily to complete just one day of shooting, despite a troubled relationship with his lead actress and endless meddling from ‘Chad Palomino,’ the gorgeous but moronic star (famously based on the director’s experience of working with Brad Pitt on Johnny Suede). To top things off, nothing at all may be happening, but the film shoot may all be a series of dreams. The film is worth watching for a sequence in which Peter Dinklage (a little person) chews out the director for casting him in a dream sequence:
Have you ever had a dream with a dwarf in it? Do you know anyone who’s had a dream with a dwarf in it? No! I don’t even have dreams with dwarves in them. The only place I’ve seen dwarves in dreams is in stupid movies like this! “Oh make it weird, put a dwarf in it!”. Everyone will go “Woah, this must be a fuckin’ dream, there’s a fuckin’ dwarf in it!”.
1. Mulholland Drive (2001)
Haters. You gonna hate? Mulholland Drive is masterpiece. Sure, it’s weird, it’s shaped like a cigarette rolled by a 14 year old, and it’s probably misogynistic and exploitative. But I don’t care. This film rocks. The first part is a dream, and it’s plenty weird – like a Nancy Drew noir with all kinds of strange details and great moments. It’s like Hollywood is dreaming itself. But when the sleeper wakes, the movie itself starts dreaming, and then things get weird.
There are many more dreams out there in movies. Dream sequences, virtual reality settings, and Dennis Quaid flicks. What are your favorites? Let us know in the comments.
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