Dreamscape (1984)

Simply Perfect

Yo, there's no way for me to review this film without saying, take your *insert ethnicity + "ass" here* to see this film,like now. You have to see it in order to know what you're really messing with.

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

After reading all of the positive reviews, I was a little bit disappointed by this movie, since it played like a very good made- for-TV movie, instead of a major motion picture. Still, on the whole it was a pleasant blast-from-the-past, and I don't regret watching it. The special effects, especially at the ending were pretty interesting, but the acting was strictly mediocre TV grade, and I could not make an real emotional connection to anybody in this movie because of that. I often like to watch older, less polished movies from the past like this one, because, while so many modern films are super slick, they are also often "plot-lite" and utterly soulless--this film is like Shakespeare compared to any from the Transformers franchise. The big logical problem I had with this film is that I kept wondering why somebody with very strong psychic abilities kept winding up in life threatening situations . It seems like you should "see" these problems coming. I mean, really, you can pick winning horses at the track, but thugs trying to kill you take you by surprise?

I really wish that I had seen this film, before I saw Inception. Of course you can't compare the graphics or special effects, in fact, the effects in Dreamscape are laughable by today's standards, but this was really the first movie to explore entering someones dreams. The story is wonderfully creative with unlimited possibilities, but at the time it was made, you couldn't rely on the special effects to make the movie, the way some films today do. What Dreamscape really needed was a young charismatic star to put the film over the top, and they found him in Dennis Quaid. The difference in his personality and the types of roles he chooses to take have done a complete turnaround over the last thirty years. The Dennis Quaid of today is a strong, emotionless character, who is determined to do whatever he sets his mind to. In Dreamscape he's funny, ambitious, and absolutely adds character to a story that could have gone either way. What the film loses in predictability and the sometimes slow pace, is more than made up for with Quaid's standout performance. I'd always heard good things about Dreamscape and how it was the inspiration for Inception, but it's a thirty year old film with outdated effects and some really cheesy stuff, I really didn't expect it to be as good it as it was.

Dennis Quaid, self-confidently impudent and smirking, plays a young psychic who is enlisted by scientists to telepathically link his mind with a series of patients who are suffering troubled dream states, sending him down the very same wormhole as the dreamer; this is merely training, however, as a very important subject--no less than the President of the United States himself!--is in need of some dream therapy, though there may be a saboteur or two in the mix. Predictably written and directed fantasy, with several cardboard supporting characters adding little to the mix and a production which fails to live up to expectations. The villains are exposed too early on, and there's no mystery or wonder in the dream sequences. Still, Quaid is a surprise; moving easily through this unconvincing scenario (which should be over-the-top but never gets up enough energy to bring itself there), the actor slips around corners and into forbidden rooms like a teen detective from a comic book. Quaid holds his own with acting stalwarts such as Max Von Sydow and Christopher Plummer, and emerges as a happily-horny hero who's not above a little dirty pool. ** from ****

A sci-fi thriller that is a major forbearer of Christopher Nolan's Inception. It also deals with people who can enter the dreams of other people. Dennis Quaid is a man with psychic abilities. Max von Sydow is a scientist who studied Quaid when he was in college. Now he recruits Quaid to work with him in his dream studies. Kate Capshaw plays von Sydow's sexy assistant (and, no, she's actually pretty tolerable, despite having annoyed us all as Indiana Jones' love interest the same year). Christopher Plummer plays a government agent who wants to use these dream experiments to help the President (Eddie Albert) overcome his nightmare problems, and David Patrick Kelly (the guy who spoke the infamous line "Warriors, come out to play-ay!") is another psychic working on the project. There really aren't many sequences that take place in the dreams, but the few that do are pretty excellent. Most of the film has Quaid discovering the devious reasons Plummer has in bringing the President into these experiments. Not a great film, by any means, but an entertaining one.