THE DEADLY DREAM
US, 1971, 73 minutes, Colour.
Lloyd Bridges, Janet Leigh, Leif Erickson, Carl Betz, Don Stroud.
Directed by Alf Kjellin.
An average telemovie which tries to explore the relationship between dream and reality and asks which is dream and which is reality. A competent cast go through the expected paces. The film visualises the theme interestingly enough but does not pull it dramatically together. Directed by Swedish actor director Alf Kjellin.
1. An enjoyable and interesting telemovie? The telemovie techniques for home enjoyment?
2. The thriller style of the film and its action incidents, balancing the domestic scenes?
3. The theme of dream and reality? What was real and what was dreamlike? What was the audience left with at the end where the confusion between the two kinds of waking and the two kinds of reality was present? The nature of the self which has two kinds of consciousness and the interrelation of dream and reality? The logic of ordinary life, the jumps in logic in dreams? Did the episodes well illustrate these themes?
4. The presentation of the normal course of events, the photographic style of these with light and colour? Hanley himself and his home, his work? Laurel and her love and support? His fellow scientists, people?
5. The contrast with the darkness of the dream world, the sinister light and darkness, shadows? The tribunal and the thugs and their brutality, the revelation of Dr Delgrave and his sinister presence, Malcolm and his being part of the tribunal, Laurel and her being part of it? The death of his psychiatrist friend?
6. The growing interrelationship between the two ways of life and the difficulty to distinguish what was reality and what was dream? The laws of logic, coherence? Did the film offer sufficient explanation?
7. How well drawn were each of the characters for their role in each life of Hanley?
8. Dreams as coming from the psyche and all the personnel in dreams being part of the self? Is this some kind of explanation of what happened in Hanley's conscious and subconscious, in reality and dream?
