Dearest Dreamers,
My friend and I just completed a mini-marathon of movie watching. We saw three films nominated for Best Picture in two days. I found it so interesting that two of the three had dream sequences.
No need for a spoiler alert. I won’t reveal any secrets or surprises and ruin your experience if you haven’t seen “Hugo” or “The Artist.”
The dream sequence in “Hugo” is not critical to the story, but it does provide dramatic insights into the fears of a young boy. Hugo lives in the enormous clockworks of a Paris train station in the 1930’s. He has been orphaned by the death of his father, and abandoned by his ne’er-do-well uncle.
It’s no wonder then, that Hugo would be fearful of so many things. And of course these fears show up in his dream: A runaway train crashes through just about everything he knows, destroying his secure, if difficult, life. Ultimately, he sees himself becoming transformed into a mechanized automaton, much like the machinery that rules his daily routines. He awakes as we often do from images that seize us in our sleep, both terrified and glad to understand that he’s still himself and his world is intact.
The images of Hugo’s nightmare are made all the more powerful by the effects of 3D. Moviegoers are sure to be gripping their armrests, just like dreamers themselves, not knowing until the end that they were experiencing the dream with Hugo.
In “The Artist,” the lead character, George Valentin, is the top box office draw of his era: silent films. As such, he has become arrogant and spoiled, expecting that he will always have his way. But when he must face the reality of the coming wave of “talkies,” he can barely keep up appearances of confidence.
George falls asleep to have an unsettling dream of the world with sound. I’d love to see the script of the dream sequence. It was so cleverly done. George’s dream begins as his life is lived, silently. Even though the audience knows there must be sound in his world, the dream suggests that his entire being is wrapped up in silence. That’s how he’s lived after all, certain that silent movies, the medium he dominates, will go on dominating.
But in his dream, sound creeps in with the tap of one dancer’s shoes, then two, then a dozen. He begins to hear their laughter in the streets among the studios’ sets. All manner of sound crashes around him. Even a feather hits the earth with a boom. He moves from startled to confused, then to fearful, and even panicked before he awakes with a start to the comfort of his silent world.
Not only do these two dream sequences add to the drama of their respective stories and the audience’s insights into the lead characters in each story, but they also speak of an integral part of our make up as human beings: our dreams ~ where we all have a starring role!
Sweet Dreams to You, Dear Dreamer!
SMYD