Product: Dreamscape [VHS] (1984)
Rating: 3.0
I have a dream...for an unedited version...
Do you ever remember your dreams? I rarely do...unless they are of the really intense kind and I wake up during the dream, and even then the images tend to slip from my conscious like grains of sand through your hand. Why am I bothering telling you this? Well, I needed some kind of opener for my review of Dreamscape (1984), a film that deals with dreams and such, and this was the best I could come up with at the time, lame as it may be...directed by Joseph Ruben, who later did Sleeping with the Enemy (1991) and Money Train (1995), Dreamscape presents quite a cast with Dennis Quaid, Max Von Sydow, Christopher Plummer, Kate Capshaw, Eddie Albert, and even George Wendt (Norm!).Dennis Quaid plays Alex Gardner, a young man of fantastic psychic abilities who has since dropped off the radar, preferring to use his `gifts' to manipulate women and pick winners at the horse track, rather than continuing to subject himself to an endless series of tests meant to study and learn of his abilities, tests conducted by Doctor Paul Novotny (Von Sydow). Seemingly content to squander his skills, Alex's path once again leads him back to Dr. Novotny and his assistant, Jane DeVries (Capshaw) as they've developed a machine that would allow someone with Alex's talents to enter the dreams of others, and possibly help those plagued with reoccurring nightmares, specifically in the President (Albert) who is suffering from apocalyptic dreams that are beginning to affect his ability to do his job. Seemingly concerned with the President's well being, Bob Blair (Plummer), government head of Dr. Novotny's project and shadowy leader of an intelligence group even the CIA fears requests Dr. Novotny assist in relieving the President of these nightmares, but we soon learn he has other plans, plans of a sinister nature involving another, less stable psychic within the project by the name of Tommy Ray Glatman (David Patrick Kelly). Can Alex uncover the plot, help the President, and stay alive? Possibly, but the odds are certainly against him...Given some of the films that came out in 1984 like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Ghostbusters, Amadeus, Footloose, Romancing the Stone, Starman, A Passage to India, and The Killing Fields, it's no surprise this `sleeper' got lost in the shuffle. I've always enjoyed it, and thought it deserved a bit more credit than it's gotten. Dennis Quaid is really good and charming as hell as the smart alecky Alex Gardner, a character who seems to be able to handle himself, yet exhibits a smidgen of naiveté which possibly stems from a core belief of decency, despite his ventures into gray areas, specifically using his skills to determine winners of horse races, earning him money to live. Max Von Sydow is also very good, although I feel as if I've seen him in similar roles so many times before, as a doctor involved in ground-breaking research, not being able to see the forces which conspire to use his research for their own, sinister means until it's too late. As far as Kate Capshaw, I have to admit I've never cared for her all that much as I found her character in Temple of Doom to be highly annoying and distracting. She's not bad here, even though she does suffer from a common malady of the 80's here in big-hairitis syndrome. Plummer is good as the conniving powerful government agent with a secret agenda, although I've seen this whole `evil government stealing research meant for the good of mankind for it's own corrupted means' theme about a thousand times before. Even so, he's perfectly suited for the part, oozing a smarmy, almost quiet charm that hides disturbing ulterior motives...I did like the aspect that his goals were driven mostly by his desire to protect what he thought needed protecting, even if he was misguided by his own sense of twisted patriotism.The special effects, while seeming quite dated now, were actually very good for the time this film came out, especially the dream sequences of the President detailing post-apocalyptic visions of decimated cities and ruinous wastes. The stop motion work, while not really appreciated by many, is really pretty good and reminds me of those old Ray Harryhausen films I love so much. One thing that annoyed me the most about this release is what's missing due to a hack editing job on a few scenes, all within dream sequences, I suppose, to more aptly fit the movie's PG-13 rating. One scene involved Quaid and Capshaw and a romantic interlude on a train with some pretty steamy stuff, but here it's cut short, removing the nudity. A second edited scene had Quaid inside a mousy man's dream about his wife, which contained some nudity that was excised out of here, and finally another scene has to do with Quaid's character helping a little boy overcome a terrifying reoccurring nightmare about a monstrous snake man. The part removed had a bit of gore in it, but it certainly wasn't anything, in my opinion, that deserved to be removed.It says the movie is available in full and widescreen anamorphic formats, but I only saw the widescreen format. The picture quality is pretty good, but the transfer print does suffer very minor age deterioration at some points, but it's hardly noticeable. The audio is much better, with Dolby Digital 2.0, new Dolby Digital 5.1 and DTS 5.1 Audio available. Special features include an audio commentary track by producer Bruce Cohn Curtis, writer David Loughery, and special effects artist Craig Reardon that's pretty good, although dry at more than a few points. Also included are a behind the scenes special effects makeup test reel and a slide show. I really wanted to give this four stars, but given that's it missing parts from a few scenes, I have to go with three...Cookieman108