Blogpost 7 : Dreams into Movies

The worst part about nightmares is their tendency to repeat themselves. An isolated nightmare may not be cause for alarm, but recurrent nightmares with the same theme become quite troubling for most dreamers. The same is true with movie dream sequences. Directors use the emotional impact of recurring nightmares to ensure that characters deal with hidden fears and imminent dangers.


          According to the article Why Movie Directors Use Recurring Dreams by Leslie Halpern from Ezine Articles, movie directors often adapt this idea of unresolved issues becoming recurrent nightmares by using increasingly horrific elements in each dream until the matter is resolved.
Troubling and terrifying recurring dreams are plentiful on the silver screen, particularly in the horror, science fiction, fantasy, and mystery thriller genres. For a quick sampling of other characters struggling with their unresolved issues through recurring dreams, watch "In Dreams" (horror), "Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones" (science fiction), "Eragon" (fantasy), and "The Talented Mr. Ripley" (thriller).

According to the article, “Although the best directors strive for producing the greatest emotional impact in viewers and stretching the limits of cinematic sorcery in their dream sequences”

I have observed that lesser directors sometimes use recurring dream sequences merely as a means of providing a back story for the characters without a lot of boring narrative. In a well-made movie, the artistic aspects of dream sequences are equally balanced with the practical need to tell the full story.

Many people have been inspired by their own dreams and the thought of dreams. 

According to the article Directors use Dreams by an Unknown author from Examiner, William Blake, artist and poet, for instance he highly valued dreams.

William Butler Yeats, who won the Nobel Prize for literature once, told Dublin producers that Cathleen in Houlihan, had come to him in a dream. It's said that Mary Shelley's idea for her novel, Frankenstein came from a nightmare she had as was for Robert Louis Stevenson who also said that he got his idea for, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde from nightmares too. So dreams are inspiring for many people and helped create some of the world's greatest works.

The Spanish film director, Jose Luis Borau felt that cinema was able to expand our dreams, so it's no wonder that film directors use their dreams and the idea of dreaming as their movie plots. Some movies that play heavily on dreams are Nolan's "Inception," Hitchcock's "Spellbound," Gilliam's "Brazil," and slashed favorite, Wes Craven's "Nightmare on Elm Street."

            A quote from the article, “fragments and images from them were used to create his cinema”

For some people, it was their dreams that helped them create some of their works. It's interesting to see how dreams can change and help someone's art.