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...'It Was All A Dream!'

Started by Dead kate moss, January 16, 2013, 09:53:45 AM

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Dead kate moss

Like Wizard Of Oz yeah. What films are - or might be - all in one of the characters sleepy old head, based perhaps on rather tenuous evidence, I don't mind. But you do have to nominate whose dream it is.

Because I just thought about Apocalypse Now, and at the start the helicopters blow shit up and Jim Morrissons sings 'This is the end...' - so maybe the start of the film is the end of Martin Sheen's dream (the movie), which is why he says 'still in Saigon, bollocks.' It was all a dream!

Or Raiders Of The Lost Ark - In reality Dr Jones is just a teacher - his exciting adventures are all a daydream of that pupil who fancies him, and closes her eyes to reveal 'love you.' She later imagines three more adventures for her teacher, but is starting to lose interest by the last one and makes it shit and puts in some teenage twat she's started fancying.


Phil_A

Pretty much everything that happens to Jeremy Northam in Cypher smacks of "This is all a (wank) fantasy the character is having", in fact I was actually disappointed when that didn't turn out to be the case, as it just made the film seem all the more implausible.

I think this one has come up a few times before, but all the events of Total Recall after Quaid "wakes up" are a dream created by the Rekall program, and the doctor that turns up near the end to tell Quaid he's trapped in a delusion is in fact telling the truth. The fade to white at the very end indicates Quaid's "death" in reality.


Dropshadow

De Niro's character ("Noodles") in "Once Upon a Time in America".

Jerzy Bondov

Minority Report, everything after Tom Cruise gets put in prison. I was so certain it was going to end with him back in prison. I think they even say that the futuristic prison is like a virtual reality thing. It would be so much better if they did that and all it would take is one shot at the end. Did they cut it or something?

I made this point on another forum by comparing it to a different, better, dystopian sci-fi film and got stamped all over for spoiling the end of it even though it came out 28 years ago. So don't mouse over this unless you have seen every film ever made:
Spoiler alert
IT SHOULD FUCKING WELL END LIKE BRAZIL DOES
[close]

Serge

The last twenty minutes of Berberian Sound Studio? (Or all of it if you subscribe to that particular theory.)

kidsick5000

Kick Ass

The film I'm most convinced filmed the "dream get out" clause.
The turning point is when Kick Ass and Big Daddy are captured and tied to chairs.
Up to that point, the action and violence - while outlandish - was within the realms of credibility. Then while they are tied to chairs it becomes much more fantastical. Hit Girl isn't just acrobatic, she's almost got super powers. And the Jet pack with twin gattling guns. That is the least plausible part of the film. These things can't hover, could not carry that kind of firepower.
Then he flys off into a sunrise.

I was expecting a Brazil-style ending, where a thug would lean into frame and say "He's gone, boss", before pulling away to reveal they never left the warehouse, the charred remains of Big Daddy next to him.

Tiny Poster

Quote from: kidsick5000 on January 16, 2013, 06:38:25 PM
Kick Ass

The film I'm most convinced filmed the dream get out clause.
The turning point is when Kick Ass and Big Daddy are captured and tied to chairs.
Up to that point, the violence - while outlandish - was within the realms of credibility. Then while they are tied to chairs it becomes much more fantastical. Hit Girl isn't just acrobatic, she's almost got super powers. And the Jet pack with twin gattling guns. That is the least plausible part of the film. These things can't hover, could not carry that kind of firepower.
Then he flys off into a sunrise.

I was expecting a Brazil-style ending, where a thug would lean into frame and say "He's gone, boss", before pulling away to reveal they never left the warehouse, the charred remains of Big Daddy next to him.

Will the sequel also be part of the dream?

Being variations on the delusional antihero thing, Taxi Driver, The King Of Comedy and Super all have "ahhh maybe it was a dream" codas.

kidsick5000

Quote from: Tiny Poster on January 16, 2013, 06:44:54 PM
Will the sequel also be part of the dream?

Being variations on the delusional antihero thing, Taxi Driver, The King Of Comedy and Super all have "ahhh maybe it was a dream" codas.

This is just looking at Kick Ass as a standalone film. There's just something about it, especially this idea of what being a superhero would really be like (ie. crappy and hurt a lot) that suggest there was an intention to make it a one film deal.
It really is just a theory, and obviously, once it tests well a sequel has to be considered.
but it's just my theory. I don't think there's anything on the DVD extras to back it up.
Even the comic book, while not killing the lead, ends on a down note.

Tiny Poster

I'm not having a go. But I think it says something about the film that, where it begins to shit upon the (already heightened) "what if 'superheroes' existed in the real world?" premise by declining into Hollywood physics and wish fulfilment, you develop an interesting dream segue theory.

As opposed to "this film has just given up".

kidsick5000

Quote from: Tiny Poster on January 16, 2013, 07:14:35 PM
I'm not having a go. But I think it says something about the film that, where it begins to shit upon the (already heightened) "what if 'superheroes' existed in the real world?" premise by declining into Hollywood physics and wish fulfilment, you develop an interesting dream segue theory.

As opposed to "this film has just given up".

Its an odd one. A combination of liking Matthew Vaughn's work along with various hints and clues pushed me to think this way. Mostly it's that there is something about the warehouse torture scene that seems so final. Up to that point, the gangsters have meant business and dealt it out with ruthless efficiency.
There's also the voiceover.  Ill need to see it again, but I recall it teases the audience that the narrator - Kick Ass - may or may not make it out alive.


Phil_A

It just occurred to me that the whole of The Descent Pt 2 has to be a dream. My reasoning for this is it follows on from the nonsensical US ending of the original film. In the original's ending - one of the characters has a miraculous escape from the caves, which it's then revealed is just a nightmare. The US edit removes the "dream" reveal and subsequent scene, so the only way the idea of a sequel can make any sense is if it is actually taking place inside the delusional mind of one of the survivors still trapped in the caves.

eluc55

#13
The film version of American Psycho leaves it ambiguous whether it's a dream/fantasy or not, but certainly leans more towards that conclusion than the book.

Interestingly, I saw an interview[nb]Just checked and it wasn't an interview. It was a quote in a post by Noodle Lizard, in the American Psycho Remake thread. [/nb] with Mary Harron, the director, where she said that she had wanted to leave it as ambiguous as the book, but felt in retrospect that she had failed to make the case for him really doing it as believable as the case for it being a fantasy.

Personally, I think it's pretty clear from the film that he didn't do everything he thinks he did - in particular, the murder of Paul Allen and the exploding car - but that other events are still perfectly feasible. I actually prefer the "fantasy" angle, though. It seems to fit the theme of conformity better, and it's pretty inconceivable he could have got away with even a fraction of the things he says he did, anyway.   


Mister Six

All of Mulholland Drive is a dream, up until the bit where
Spoiler alert
whatserface meets the Cowboy a second time and wakes up, remembers how she had the love of her life killed, and tops herself. Same deal as Lost Highway.
[close]

Not 'official', just theories, but in Blue Velvet
Spoiler alert
Kyle Maclachlan's character gets shot in the cupboard at the end, and all the stuff about killing Dennis Hopper and watching suspiciously fake robins from his happily restored domestic bliss are all in his head as he dies.
[close]
And in Taxi Driver
Spoiler alert
Travis Bickle bleeds out on the sofa after being shot up at the end of Taxi Driver, but is so wracked with self-loathing that he can't quite bring himself to have a truly happy ending (hence him dreaming about the prostitute's shitty home life). The bit where he catches his reflection at the end (followed by a shot of the city reflected in the rear view mirror, Bickle's face erased from the shot) symbolises his sudden realisation that it's just a dream.
[close]

Most 'it was all a dream' endings are shit and disappointing though.

Nuclear Optimism

I hate people who think the end of Taxi Driver is a dream. The whole point is that an unhinged vigilante has completely got away with it, this time, and the weird bit when he looks in the mirror is to show that he's not cured, he's still as paranoid as ever, and next time he won't be so lucky. Those newspaper cuttings and that letter from Iris' parents are real.

Custard

I've said this a couple times before, but I still think that the nutty, horror aspects of Drag Me To Hell are actually all in the lead character's mind.

The constant mentions of food, and her struggles with it, lead me to believe that it may all be some depressive, bulimic/anorexic daydream, and/or delusion

Her real battle is with her depression and struggle with food, her lack of success at work, and the rest is fantasy

I know it could go either way, but makes you think, dunnit!2

eluc55

Quote from: Nuclear Optimism on January 17, 2013, 07:59:11 AM
I hate people who think the end of Taxi Driver is a dream. The whole point is that an unhinged vigilante has completely got away with it, this time, and the weird bit when he looks in the mirror is to show that he's not cured, he's still as paranoid as ever, and next time he won't be so lucky. Those newspaper cuttings and that letter from Iris' parents are real.

It's totally stupid, though, unless it's a dream. It's been years since I saw it, but don't the public and media make him a hero for killing all those people? Just the fact he gets away after being shot that many times is ridiculous.

I don't think it is a dream necessarily. If anything, I think it's supposed to be real. But I do think its a terrible, dishonest ending for the film, and would be improved by it being a dying fantasy, or how he had imagined things going before he gets shot.   

Big Jack McBastard

Quote from: Mister Six on January 17, 2013, 04:42:09 AM
All of Mulholland Drive is a dream, up until the bit where
Spoiler alert
whatserface meets the Cowboy a second time and wakes up, remembers how she had the love of her life killed, and tops herself. Same deal as Lost Highway.
[close]

I thought it was up until the point where
Spoiler alert
the blue box is opened in Club Silencio
[close]
(or whatever it was called)

Mini

Quote from: eluc55 on January 17, 2013, 12:32:46 AM
The film version of American Psycho leaves it ambiguous whether it's a dream/fantasy or not, but certainly leans more towards that conclusion than the book.

Interestingly, I saw an interview[nb]Just checked and it wasn't an interview. It was a quote in a post by Noodle Lizard, in the American Psycho Remake thread. [/nb] with Mary Harron, the director, where she said that she had wanted to leave it as ambiguous as the book, but felt in retrospect that she had failed to make the case for him really doing it as believable as the case for it being a fantasy.

Personally, I think it's pretty clear from the film that he didn't do everything he thinks he did - in particular, the murder of Paul Allen and the exploding car - but that other events are still perfectly feasible. I actually prefer the "fantasy" angle, though. It seems to fit the theme of conformity better, and it's pretty inconceivable he could have got away with even a fraction of the things he says he did, anyway.   

I prefer to think of it as real, the fact that no one seems to care or remember at the end makes it all the more scathing of these people.

Sam

Lost.

Not a film, but if the final episode had consisted of the writers defecating all over a fan of the show, at length and in lurid, horrifying detail it would still have been twelve times better than the rotten, wank infested abortion cake of an ending they centipedally spewed out of their collective withered anuses, like the drooling half-wit shitpipers they are.

Ending? End-dung more like?!

Kane Jones

Quote from: Sam on January 17, 2013, 03:13:11 PM
Lost.

Not a film, but if the final episode had consisted of the writers defecating all over a fan of the show, at length and in lurid, horrifying detail it would still have been twelve times better than the rotten, wank infested abortion cake of an ending they centipedally spewed out of their collective withered anuses, like the drooling half-wit shitpipers they are.

Ending? End-dung more like?!

I didn't watch Lost and I never intend to.  What happened at the end?  Was it all a dream?

Custard

I honestly think that a much better ending for Lost, would be Jack suddenly stop fighting Fake Locke, turn to look directly into the camera and say "we don't have an ending for this folks, as we've just been making it up as we go along. Sorry. Was a laugh though, eh?"

*Camera pans across and zooms into a 35 year old looking Walt. Who winks*

That'd be a great ending. I'd buy all the DVDs

Mister Six

Quote from: Kane Jones on January 17, 2013, 03:17:10 PM
I didn't watch Lost and I never intend to.  What happened at the end?  Was it all a dream?

Spoiler alert
They all died and met again in a church in the afterlife, then went on to Heaven. Really.
[close]


vrailaine

I liked the dream sequence in Black Pond, felt pretty dreamlike, I thought.

Mister Six

Quote from: Big Jack McBastard on January 17, 2013, 11:37:37 AM
I thought it was up until the point where
Spoiler alert
the blue box is opened in Club Silencio
[close]
(or whatever it was called)

Just checked wikipedia and we're both right - the cowboy appears after the box is opened again (though I was wrong in that technically they don't 'meet' again - however since the cowboy is in thingy's dream, and since she is therefore viewing him, they do 'meet' in a way).

Mister Six

Quote from: Glebe on January 17, 2013, 10:01:41 PM
SFX - 30 Great Sci-Fi Dream Sequences.

In that first paragraph they mistake Vampira for Elvira. Wouldn't have happened back when I was reading SFX.

Nuclear Optimism

Quote from: eluc55 on January 17, 2013, 11:25:44 AM
It's totally stupid, though, unless it's a dream. It's been years since I saw it, but don't the public and media make him a hero for killing all those people? Just the fact he gets away after being shot that many times is ridiculous.

He doesn't get shot too many times. He really only gets nicked in the neck. And the whole point of the ending is that the public would make him a hero, even though he's clearly dangerously unhinged. If he had taken out his rage on the senator, then he would have been a villain. But if he takes it out on some pimps and gangsters, he's held up as a hero, even though his motivation is the same in either case.

Whether this would actually happen in the real world is a little trickier, but as the people in the brothel were armed he could perhaps claim self defense, and if Iris testified in his favour, coupled with public opinion, it's just about possible that he would get off. Stretching it a bit, but still. You know what America is like. You could shoot a fleeing burglar in the back of the head with a shotgun and the public would come out in support.

Look at Bernhard Goetz for example, the "Subway Vigilante". Shot and killed four criminals on the subway, and was only sent down for illegal possession of a firearm. He was out in less than a year.

If it's all a dream then the whole "point" is missing. Also, if it was a dream they wouldn't have that creepy bit at the end when he looks in the mirror. That moment is supposed to suggest that he'll end up doing the same sort of thing in the future, but next time he'll be arrested or killed. And lo and behold the great public hero is actually a pyscho killer.

Tiny Poster

It's ambiguous, so it can actually make two (or more) points at the same time. AMBIGUITY, PEOPLE

See also the end of Drive.