Analysis of Visual Representations of Dreams in Films With Focus On Animation (2009)

Diplomarbeit zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades eines Diplom Digital Artist
(FH) an der Babelsberg Film School
Dreams and Films

Analysis of Visual Representations of Dreams in
Films with Focus on Animation
Vorgelegt von: Sadun Kal

Matr.-Nr.: DA 0603191
1.Prüfer: Prof. Angela Kern
2.Prüfer: Matthias Haase
Berlin, den 10.09.09

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N©! 2009
No copyright, no copyleft, no nothing. Feel free.
Abstract
In this thesis the artistic representations of dreams in films are analyzed. The visual properties,
characteristic elements and further details of the representations of dreams are examined. The
main focus is on animation and how dreams are represented in that art form. The research
identifies the distinguishing properties of dreams in films, illuminates the reasoning behind
artistic decisions and serves as a potential basis for future research and an inspiration source for
future artists.
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Contents
1. Introduction ......................................................................................................................................................... 4
1.1. Imagination and Reality ............................................................................................................................... 4
1.2. The Purpose of This Thesis .......................................................................................................................... 4
1.3. Defining Dreams .......................................................................................................................................... 5
1.4. Overview...................................................................................................................................................... 6
2. General Characteristics of Filmic Dreams ........................................................................................................ 7
2.1. Logic and Nature of the Dreams in Films........................................................................................................... 7
2.1.1. Regular Dreaming ....................................................................................................................................... 8
2.1.2. Technological Dreaming ........................................................................................................................... 10
2.1.3. Supernatural Dreaming .............................................................................................................................. 12
2.1.4. Hallucinations and Delusions .................................................................................................................... 13
2.2. Themes and Narrative Roles ............................................................................................................................. 15
2.2.1. Dream as the Object of Interest ................................................................................................................. 15
2.2.2. General Narrative Purposes ....................................................................................................................... 16
2.2.3. Wish Fulfillment and Fantasy .................................................................................................................... 17
2.2.4. Nightmares ................................................................................................................................................ 18
2.2.5. Reality vs. Dream ...................................................................................................................................... 20
2.2.6. Other .......................................................................................................................................................... 23
2.3. Visuals .............................................................................................................................................................. 25
2.3.1. Transitions ................................................................................................................................................. 25
2.3.2. Blur and Visual Vagueness........................................................................................................................ 28
2.3.3. Time and Motion ....................................................................................................................................... 30
2.3.4. Fog and Clouds .......................................................................................................................................... 31
2.3.5. Color and Look .......................................................................................................................................... 32
2.3.6. Contextual Design ..................................................................................................................................... 34
3. The Role of Animation ...................................................................................................................................... 37
3.1. Animation and Live Action Dreams ................................................................................................................. 37
3.2. Advantages of Animation ................................................................................................................................. 38
3.3. Disadvantages of Animation ............................................................................................................................ 39
3.4. Selected Animation Examples and Further Discussion .................................................................................... 40
4. Conclusion .......................................................................................................................................................... 45
Bibliography ................................................................................................................................................................ 47
Filmography ................................................................................................................................................................ 48
Introduction | 4
1. Introduction
This thesis is concerned with visual representations of dreams in films; their general properties and the potential
meaning of animation in relation to them. Introductorily some background information is given, a practical
definition of dreams and an overview of the planned approach is provided.
1.1. Imagination and Reality
The human imagination has been the source of countless creations. This gift enables people to mentally go beyond
the boundaries imposed upon them by the laws of the universe; both time and space become nothing more than toys
to play with once a mind sets off to imagine alternative realities. This potential for adventure has always attracted
and fascinated human beings. In fact, these adventures have become a part daily life. Almost all novels, paintings,
songs and of course video games and motion pictures are the products of this desire; a longing for something more
than just the immediate reality, for one reason or another.
Of course humans don’t always have full control over their imagination, or its effects on them. There are different
forms of imagining. While sometimes a completely conscious imagining activity is put into use, other times people
just let the job to their unconsciousness and sometimes they do so without even being aware of it. This is how
different kinds of dreams come into existence which can delight, excite, surprise, shock or horrify even the supposed
dreamers although they seem to source from their minds.
Many art forms like motion pictures, most of which are basically elaborated daydreams themselves, sometimes try
to capture this fascinating process of dreaming. Filmmakers dream of other dreams within their filmed “dreams”.
And interestingly the idea of taking a closer look at that phenomenon for this thesis also surfaced while the author
was in a dream state.
1.2. The Purpose of This Thesis
Dreams that occur during sleep and throughout the day for various reasons, in their raw form, are not tangible, solid
objects. They’re abstract, complex, vague and temporary. Just to notice their existence often requires some effort or
luck. All this makes it really hard for humans to communicate what exactly happens in their imagination to others.
Often the dreamers don’t even know it themselves. So when artists aspire to show their audience a dream, this goal
alone is likely to be a big challenge independent from the content of the dream because of dreams’ unique,
mysterious nature. Their essence is hard to obtain. Although while this may seem like a terrible disadvantage for the
artist, the same problem exists for the audience too; they don’t have exact knowledge on the nature of dreams either.
Therefore it is difficult to find the criteria by which artists’ interpretation of dreams can be judged.
This mystery shrouding the dreams, in addition to the extreme diversity already present among dreams, creates a lot
of extra room for artistic freedom. Consequently there are many different ways of treating dreams, and huge
differences between all the ways the dreams are represented in all art forms.
Introduction | 5
This thesis aims at providing a basic understanding of the way dreams and similar activities related to imagination
are visually represented in films, with an emphasis on animated films. The goal is to explore and understand the
distinct characteristics of the relationship between films and various types of dreams. The narrative and intellectual
aspects of such representations are also included, but the visual aspects will be the focus. This means that the active
visual representation of the imaginary by the filmmakers is of primary concern.
There is currently relatively little research done on the connection between films and dreams, and the majority of the
existent information has little to do with the visual aspects. This text should function as an introductory source into
this unexplored topic in the future.
The reason for the emphasis on animation is because animation, with its higher degree of independence from reality,
allows filmmakers to go further than they can just with live-action. Contemplating on the differences between
various mediums and understanding the limitations or advantages/disadvantages can aid people’s artistic decisions.
This research can give readers a better understanding of the potential of dreams and by familiarizing them with
numerous examples of the use of dreams in films it can also inspire more interesting and powerful usage of filmic
dreams in the future.
1.3. Defining Dreams
The nighttime dreams occurring during sleep are not the only times when the imagination results in visual
imagery. Although the activity during sleep is very relevant, and it is the one that concerns the scientific study of
dreams most, different types of “dreams” can also occur outside the sleep state. For practical reasons, throughout
this text the word “dream” will generally be referring to all forms of visual imaginations in films. This includes
daydreams, hallucinations, certain kinds of visions and of course the dreams occurring during sleep. Distinctions
between these different types will also be made throughout the text.
The reason for including all forms of imaginary visuals instead of just regular dreams is that the text focuses on
the filmic dreams and their appearance. Because the dreams in films are not designed based strictly on reality and
scientific research1, the visual distinction between all the different types of imaginary visuals (e.g. dreams vs.
daydreams) is not as clear as it might be in the field of psychology. Following that vagueness, since the focus of
the research is on the visual representations of the imaginary, the examination of all the different products of the
imagination together is considered as justified. So the word dream is used in a broad sense in accordance with the
nature of the art form and what follows will be an examination of the art form rather than its real-world subjects.
Also particularly dreamlike features of abstract or surreal works of art are within the boundaries of this
research due to the visual relevance. When appropriate and useful, such works will be examined in the same
light as a representation of the dreams of a dreamer who is not directly visible within the artwork itself.
1
For much more on that topic see the book “Dreams on Film: The Cinematic Struggle Between Art and Science” by
Leslie Halpern (2003).
Introduction | 6
1.4. Overview
In the next chapter the dreams with visual representations in films are closely examined. The content of dreams in
motion pictures are categorically analyzed with many examples from films. The nature and types of dreams, their
visual representations’ narrative roles and the visual characteristics are the main points of interest. Through this
dissection a clear understanding of dream representations in films should emerge.
Following that the focus is more intensely on animation. Different qualities of various animation techniques and
live-action with regard to dream depictions in films are discussed. A basic overview of the advantages,
disadvantages, limits and possibilities of the techniques are given with help from selected examples.
The dreams in films without any implication of visual representation are excluded from examination in this text.
This means that just a narrative phenomenon that is related to dreams will not be considered relevant due to the
focus on the visuals. All non-visual products of imagination (like auditory hallucinations) are also considered
irrelevant.
In the final chapter the meaning of the thesis and the conclusions reached are be summarized.
General Characteristics of Filmic Dreams | 7
2. General Characteristics of Filmic Dreams
Dreams in movies usually display specific characteristics which distinguish them from the reality of the movies. In
many cases these signals immediately make the audience aware that what they see is not a part of the filmic reality.
Sometimes these signals can be more subtle and even impossible to figure out until the end of the movie, or even
after the movie is finished.
In this chapter the nature of all kinds of filmic dreams are discussed based on numerous examples from films. First
the general structure and laws of the realm of filmic dreams are examined through categorization to reveal the
aspects in which the dreams significantly differ from regular filmic reality. Then the various roles of dreams within
the context of films’ story are observed to acquire a better understanding of the dreams potential narrative value.
Finally the visual aspect of filmic dreams is closely examined to explore the ways in which dreams have so far been
visually represented by filmmakers.
2.1. Logic and Nature of the Dreams in Films

In a way all fictitious art is created in the longing for something that doesn’t really exist. So most films are an
extension of reality; going beyond the reality. This in itself frees the filmmakers from some of the constraints of
reality. Films often stretch things in certain directions to reach a desired effect. Even if films pretend to show
something out of our reality they do not hesitate to exaggerate things and risk being implausible. The audience is
often prepared to cooperate and comply with the required stretch of imagination, because they also want to lose
themselves in new adventures. In movies the laws of the universe are deemed to be flexible whenever it seems
necessary.
Other times films readily admit that they do not try to fake being real, because the stories obviously take place in
imaginary universes. Then it’s even possible to see “magic” or some imagined technology with equal magnificence.
Of course there are also movies combine the reality and surrealism or movies that are purely abstract and even more
disconnected from reality than a usual fantasy or a science fiction.
Yet all these are still examples for the real human “dreams”; movies are the products of human imagination. Many
movies tend to sacrifice a certain amount of logic and plausibility to tell an interesting story. Supernatural elements
and impossible events are seen regularly. The same tendency also exists in the dreams which are within those
fictitious realities. In a way dreams in movies have to be even more supernatural, or differently supernatural, than
their real-world counterparts, because they have to stay loyal to the supernaturalism of the film’s universe and
usually they also have to make it clear that they’re doubly imaginary.
What follows is an exploration of different aspects of dreams in films. Various examples are brought up in order to
understand how the logic and laws of nature in dreams may differ from the reality’s. Four main categories have been
selected to distinguish between different types of dreaming and imagination activity represented in films. The first
category is about regular dreams. The other categories are titled “Technological Dreaming”, “Supernatural
Dreaming” and “Hallucinations and Delusions”.
2.1.1. Regular Dreaming
The regular dreaming category refers to the common dreaming activity occurring during sleep or activities in other
altered states of consciousness which resemble that type of loose imagination activity. In many films the dreams that
occur during sleep are used for a number of different purposes (See section 2.2. Themes and Narrative Roles) but
the examples examined below are the ones that engage human dreams more on their own terms rather than trying to
force them into certain roles for narrative purposes. In other words these examples are of dreams which seem to be
relatively freer to be “dreamlike”. The dream sequences which have little to do with extreme imagination activity
are excluded from consideration in this section in order to clearly demonstrate the extent of potential distinguishing
features of filmic dreams.
Michel Gondry’s Science of Sleep (2006) is a movie within which the nature of dreams has been intentionally
explored in an experimental fashion. The story takes place in the real world2, but it’s a film rich with dream
sequences. Those sequences emphasize the irrational nature of the dreams occurring during sleep: For example at
the beginning of a dream the main character Stephane is shown as the host of his own nonsensical TV cooking show
in his dreams. In the bizarre studio the walls and all the technical equipments are made of cardboards and the walls
are covered with egg cartons. (Fig. 1) As the host of the cooking show he says that he’ll show the imaginary
audience how dreams are prepared. He mixes things like “memories”, “random thoughts”, “reminiscences of the
day”, which are represented in forms of food substances, and cooks them. Once the “dream” is done he goes towards
an opening in the studio –a blue screen- and disappears into the dream he just prepared. He goes from the first stage
of his dream to a deeper state. And the dreams can have a very associative, essentially irrational, chaotic structure.
People may speak in various non-existent languages with differing accents and their lips don’t match the sounds
they make. The size, form and location of everything can change rapidly and the universal laws of nature seem
flexible. Lifeless objects can move on their own and the gravity isn’t of much concern.
Similarly in another one of Gondry’s films, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), the viewer follows the
main character Joel through a long, unusual dream-like process. In a depressed state Joel wants to forget all about
his girlfriend Clementine. So he seeks help from a company which offers such a service. He takes some sleeping
pills and after he falls asleep the technicians of the company arrive to begin the procedure: to erase his memories
which are related to his girlfriend. The audience witnesses what’s going on in Joel’s head during that process and
again it becomes clear that he is no longer in the “real world” of the movie. The locations and people suddenly
change. Joel sees himself from outside living the memories in his mind. As the memories are being erased one by
one things get quite bizarre: One of Clementine’s legs disappear while she’s walking, and then she disappears
entirely. And sometimes the faces of the people or any other object may disappear. At one point Joel runs after
Clementine. But paradoxically no matter towards which direction Joel runs to reach her, he seems to arrive at the
point where he started out from. Sometimes time progresses faster, slows down or is reversed. When the character
goes back to his childhood memories he becomes smaller but not younger; he’s still the same middle-aged guy only
as tall as a child, and he behaves and is perceived by others in the memory like the child he was.
2
In Science of Sleep, there are a few quite fantastic occasions when the dream world and the real world seem to mix
together but the whole thing feels quite natural due to the elegant integration. Gondry explains such moments as
willingly shared daydreams between the characters in the scene: These surreal incidents are not a part of the film’s
reality but the characters pretend that they’re real and the viewers share their perspective too. (Source:
http://www.pixelsurgeon.com/interviews/interview.php?id=254 [Accessed on September 2009])
Figure 1: Science of Sleep (2006) - Stephane “cooked” a dream in his mind and he's entering a second stage of
dreaming through the blue screen. The screen to the left shows how the finished dream will supposedly look with a
background replacing the blue screen.
Even just these two examples clearly indicate that all kinds of rules can be flexible in dreams, or in other words
there aren’t necessarily any objective rules. Only a subjective, very person-specific and loose logical structure seems
to exist.
Another significant example is Joel and Ethan Coen’s cult comedy The Big Lebowski (1998). It contains two
humorous and surreal dream sequences. Their content is not completely meaningless but the associations with the
dreamer’s life are very loosely defined. This freedom allows these dreams to be quite ridiculous. In one dream the
filmmakers play with gravity and the sizes of the objects. The second dream starts out like a big, crazy, astral
musical about bowling and women. It ends as an absurd nightmare. The second dream feels as dreamlike as it does
primarily because it doesn’t really make much sense. It’s not because it’s incredibly supernatural but because
everything seems so out of the ordinary. The setting, the costumes and the behavior of the people in it just don’t
belong to the film’s reality, or any other reality known to mankind for that matter.
The Cell (2005) is also exceptionally rich with dreams full of surreal bizarreness. Again the characters can instantly
change shape, morph, turn into people with different personalities, abilities and costumes. They can travel back into
their memories and even appear as a child. The environments inside the dreams are often also very unworldly. The
force of gravity can change directions and time may flow at different speeds.
Dreams in films can also be dominated by abstract visuals: The brief nightmare sequence in Hitchcock’s Vertigo
(1958) has some abstract elements like a head floating through a tunnel and an animated morphing/dissolving bunch
of flowers. In Alfred Hitchcock’s Spellbound (1945), there’s a dream sequence which plays a key role in the film
and it was designed by the famous surrealist painter Salvador Dali. This led to the dream sequence looking partially
like a surrealist Dali painting in motion. (Fig. 2) The shape of certain objects, the backgrounds and the lighting
clearly separate these scenes from the rest of the movie (See section 2.3.6. Contextual Design for more).
Figure 2: Spellbound (1945) – The dream sequence from the film is designed by the surrealist painter Salvador Dali
and it’s visually dominated by his artistic influence.
To sum it up; dreams with irrational, unnatural events and structures are not rare in films. What such dream
sequences have in common is that they display things which would normally make no sense. Things that are
physically impossible to happen and bizarre events that are normally very unlikely to happen -if not also impossible-
are regularly seen in dreams. Certain forms, structures and strange behaviors that are featured in these dream
sequences would serve no materialistic function in our world other than being art. But such surreal determinants can
be the dominant factors in dreams and change the rules completely.
Apart from the usual sleep induced dreams or daydreams there are also various other kinds of dreams in films.
Dreams are not always the products of a sleeping mind, or a mind that can be considered “ill” or “insane”. An
altered perception or altered states of consciousness can also drive a character in a film away from the film’s reality.
2.1.2. Technological Dreaming
The term technological dreaming refers to the dream sequences featured in some science-fiction films, which come
to existence through some kind of support from imaginary technological devices, or at least influenced by them. The
structural qualities of such dreams are significantly different from earlier examples.
The Spanish science fiction Open Your Eyes (Abre los Ojos)(1997)3 features a technologically induced constant
dream state. The depressed protagonist contracts with a company specializing in cryonics and he lets them freeze his
body after his death until a time comes where he can be resurrected and his problem solved. He also applies for the
“artificial perception” option4 and once he is resurrected in the future, he doesn’t wake up but he rather unknowingly
continues a dream life in the past. In that artificial reality he has the power to live exactly the life he desires, but for
the most part the rules in the dream world appear to be the same as in the film’s reality.
A similar example can be found in The Matrix (1999) and its sequels: The story also takes place in the future where
almost the entire humanity is unknowingly living in a collective dream; a virtual reality called the Matrix. But this
time it’s controlled by machines, and humans are merely their pawns. This simulation of reality is apparently so
successful that nobody doubts its verity unless they can be literally unplugged to see the reality. Unlike in normal
dreams, this illusion is so captivating that dying in the simulation leads to a real death of the physical body. What
can be seen in that virtual reality is generally not that dreamlike though, both because humans’ capabilities are
strictly bound to the digital programming within the Matrix, which mimics the physical laws of the real world, and
because the people –not knowing that the Matrix isn’t real- don’t attempt to do extraordinary things. So the minds of
those who participate in the “dream” can influence Matrix’s reality only to a limited degree. Nevertheless, while
normal humans must obey what they believe to be the physical laws of that reality, the rebels (those who are aware
of the situation and fighting against the machines) can come up with new computer programs and train themselves
to go beyond the default limitations inside the Matrix. In so doing they can gain extreme acrobatic abilities, fighting
skills and more. A small number of exceptional individuals may also become aware of the reality without outside
help, and they can manipulate the simulated reality to a certain degree. This element of flexibility sometimes results
in relatively supernatural or surreal scenes throughout the entire Matrix series and The Animatrix (2003); a
collection of nine animated short films based on the universe of the series. But the last animated short titled
Matriculated features a robot plugged into a virtual reality created by the humans and what can be seen in there is
much more dreamlike. Similarly, hacked minds trapped in a nightmarish virtual reality can be seen in the Japanese
animated feature Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence (2004).
Total Recall (1990), a science fiction film loosely based on a short story by Phillip K. Dick, also features a
technology which installs false memories into a person’s brain and gives them the impression that they’ve been
living interesting adventures when in reality they’ve merely been asleep for a short while. In the film a potential
false memory is referred to as a possible dream, even though the logic and nature of what happens is again no
different from the film’s reality (See section 2.2.5. Reality vs. Dream for more).
In the examples mentioned above, what the dreamer’s mind loses itself in can be more accurately described as a
virtual reality rather than a naturally occurring dream. And what happens in that alternative reality appears to be
restricted by the technology if not completely created and controlled by it. This is not like in normal dreams where
the human imagination is set loose and rules the dreams, but it’s more like a forced, directed imagination. The
individuals’ minds can still significantly influence the content of the visual representations, but not greatly affect the
fundamental rules present in the dreams.
In Dreamscape (1984), The Cell (2005) and the animated feature Paprika (2006) technological devices enable
researchers to enter other people’s dreams, instead of determining the content of the dreams. So basically these are
3
Also its American remake Vanilla Sky (2001) has an almost identical story.
4
“Artificial Perception” is called “Lucid Dream” in Vanilla Sky.
not restricted to be any less dreamlike than other “natural” dreams in films, but the influence of multiple persons
within the dream change the main dreamer’s experience. In addition to that, the device in Paprika also makes it
possible for dreams to secretly invade others’ unconscious minds even when they’re awake, which has some major
consequences in the film.
2.1.3. Supernatural Dreaming
This section is about the dreams which seem to be influenced by some forces which are not believed to exist by the
vast majority of today’s scientific authorities. These too have certain characteristics which distinguish them from
regular dreams.
What Dreams May Come (1998) uses the concept of life after death as a realm where the dead people’s imagination
defines their own heaven and hell. (According to the story the human imagination doesn’t necessarily source from
the brain -“a piece of meat”- but rather from a spirit/soul.) There isn’t a single heaven but rather multiple versions of
heaven specific to each person’s own dreams about what heaven should look like. Consequently the protagonist
initially finds himself in a heaven which looks exactly like his wife’s paintings. His whole world is made of paint at
first; a dynamic, three dimensional oil painting. (Fig. 7) As he gains more control on his abilities he can change
things any time as he wishes. Hell on the other hand is a place where everyone can be trapped in their own, unique
kind of misery they’ve constructed for themselves in their own imagination. The “dreams” in this film are more
fluid than the technological dreams but they’re still not as wildly unpredictable as the regular dreams due to the
constrictions present in the afterworld.
In Flatliners (1990) a small group of medical students experiment with near-death experiences. One by one, they
allow each other to die under their control for a few minutes and the dead person supposedly faces the “life after
death” during that short period of time. All those who try it find themselves in a dreamlike mind trip into their own
past. Strangely, after they wake up they continue to see similar visions in waking life too, and they even seem to
physically interact with them. 5 The initial dream they enter in this case is more like an elaborate, fancy flashback
rather than a regular dream and the visions that follow are more like hallucinations.
Apart from that there are also cases where the dreams clearly and intensely influence the reality. One of the most
widely known examples is The Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) and its sequels, where the undead villain Freddy
Krueger can kill people through their dreams, which causes people to be afraid of falling asleep. Dreams with
Freddy can be significantly surreal but mostly they’re under the control of Freddy instead of the dreamers and the
dreamers have little time to lose themselves in imaginative dreams when fighting for their lives.
It is also fairly common to see dreams and dreamlike visions in the context of psychic abilities: In Dreams (1999)
features a woman who is haunted by troubling visions about a man, both while asleep and awake. In The Gift (2001)
a fortune-teller solves the mystery behind a murder with help from her psychic visions and dreams. In Final
Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001) a woman communicates with the ghosts of alien life forms through his dreams.
The science fiction film Minority Report (2002) has a trio of introverted psychics. They float all day long in an
5
Although the characters in Flatliners seem to be convinced that they experienced something that can be considered
supernatural, the film offers no objective proof for that belief. It seems possible to interpret the events in a way
which only requires the viewer to believe that the characters become delusional after their near-death experiences.
isolation chamber and usually do nothing but try to foresee the future. Their visions are recorded by a high-tech
specialized police department in order to prevent murders before they can even happen. 6
The “dreamers” in those examples are not always asleep or in a dream state otherwise. The content of such psychic
visions are generally based on the film’s reality despite their relatively dreamlike visual and aural qualities. There
are no surreal or abstract elements like in regular imaginative dreams; just visions about things or events from
another space and time within the same universe. This is also the case for the equivalent of such visions in more
fantastic film universes like those of The Lord of the Rings (2001) and Harry Potter series (2001), Eragon (2006)
and Dark City (1998). The psychic-like visions and dreams in such movies tell more about the universe of the film
than the dreamer’s inner world.
All in all supernatural dreams are, in comparison to regular dreams, less about a fluid imagination activity and more
about interactions of supernatural kind.
2.1.4. Hallucinations and Delusions
This section is about imagination activities that take place even when the “dreamer” is awake and is not supposed to
be dreaming under common conditions. The uncommon conditions may be caused by various mind-altering
substances or they may be unusual mental conditions.
In Terry Gilliam’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998), the two main characters are under the influence of
various psychoactive drugs the whole time. They’re regularly caught up in their absurd imaginations. Their insane
perception is not stable either; it can change from minute to another, from one delusional thought to another. The
audience is often shown things the way they perceive them to be.
The science fiction A Scanner Darkly (2006) features also a group of drug addicts. The film starts with a character
obsessively trying to wash off illusionary insects from his and his dog’s body. Similar hallucinations occur a few
times throughout the film.
Another interesting example is The Bear (1988) where a bear cub wonders off into the forest and naively eats a few
red mushrooms. It is briefly shown how his perception is altered as he lays down, freaks out and watches a colorful
mushroom fly and morph above his head.
What separates such hallucinations from regular dreams is that they’re perceived to be a part of the film’s reality by
the characters, and not a different reality independent from it.7 They physically interact with their hallucinations, or
the hallucinations directly affect their interactions with real objects and people. And the unconscious mind or the
memories of a person is not the determining factor when it comes to most hallucinations. Their phobias and interests
might be reflected in what they hallucinate but the connection is very loose. Unlike regular dreams, hallucinations
are more spontaneous and belong to the present moment.
An exception to that description may be the hallucination sequences in Blueberry (2004). The film features very
6
The dreaming activity here is supported by a technological facility, but the source of the visions remains
supernatural, which is the main factor that determines the dreams’ exact nature.
7
In A Scanner Darkly (2006) there is one particular scene where one of the characters exceptionally seems to be
completely aware of the fact that he’s hallucinating. He doesn’t react strongly to his friends turning into insects.
heavy and complex hallucinations caused by some kind of psychedelic substance used by Native Americans. But
despite that the characters seem to be somewhat aware of the unreal nature of their hallucinations. They appear to
find what they perceive interesting but they do not freak out like the characters in earlier examples, which may also
be because they’re physically weakened by the same substance.
Another significant example is Altered States (1980), where a psychologist experiments with his state of
consciousness. He uses sensory deprivation tanks filled with water and consumes psychedelic mushrooms to explore
possible realities beyond the immediate reality. What he sees cannot be classified as pure hallucinations because it
later turns out that there is more to it, but his visions certainly don’t belong to the dominant reality of the film.
They’re technically not dreams or daydreams either because the “dreamer” is neither asleep nor just calmly
dreaming about things while awake. His visions start out as powerful mind trips and eventually they become
something much more cosmic and intense, and start to mix with the normal reality. This makes at least some of the
sequences supernatural hallucinations, but others remain explainable with natural psychology.
Structurally the visions in Altered States are very chaotic and unstable, most similar to those in Blueberry among all
the examples. In both films the hallucinations become so intense at times that they seem to disconnect the
hallucinating person from the filmic reality completely; they just lose themselves in strange images. In that regard
the hallucination arguably turns into something much like a dream, and differs significantly from what the
characters in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and A Scanner Darkly seem to go through most of the time.
Then there are also deluded characters like Gollum in Lord of the Rings and Tyler Durden in Fight Club (1999) that
seem to have multiple identities. But in these films such delusions are shown from the perspective of the characters
and accordingly they aren’t depicted any differently than the film’s reality. For example when the characters talk to
themselves the film shows either two equally real looking characters talking to each other, which is what the
characters believe is happening, or the deluded person talking to himself, which is what’s really happening. But both
scenarios don’t result in any obvious visual distinctions between two personas, because one either believes in the
existence of both equally, or knows that one of them doesn’t really exist. The place between two perspectives of
reality is mostly skipped and there are just jumps between the two. It’s also similar in A Beautiful Mind (2001)
where the protagonist develops schizophrenia instead of a multiple personality disorder. This time the character is
once again talking to himself but the responses to him are only in his head, despite being presented differently
throughout the film. The imaginary people are indicated to be imaginary only later in the film when they seem to
appear and disappear or move from place to place without a rational explanation.
So there are different types of hallucinations. The degree to which a hallucination strays away from the reality and
becomes more dreamlike differs from case to case. The more intense a hallucination the more dreamlike it is, and
consequently the hallucinating person becomes more dysfunctional and closer to someone asleep in a dream state.
2.2. Themes and Narrative Roles
When it comes to storytelling dreams are rarely “just dreams”. Most films do not make the effort to tell what each
character dreams about when they go to sleep. But when films do show some dreams, then there’s usually an
important reason for it.8 The reasons may vary but in the end it’s about adding value to the work, one way or the
other.
2.2.1. Dream as the Object of Interest
One reason may be that the dream’s content alone is considered valuable enough to show even if it doesn’t seem to
have any significant implication on the flow of the story that takes place outside the dream.
All the film adaptations of the novel Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (Lewis Carroll, 1865), like the famous
Disney version Alice in Wonderland (1951), are not interesting because of Alice’s reality, but interesting because of
the fantastic adventure in Wonderland, which is just the product of Alice’s dream.
The famous musical-fantasy film The Wizard of Oz (1939) is also for the most part just a young girl’s dream. The
first fifteen minutes set the stage for what’s to come and for more than 80 minutes what’s shown is only Dorothy’s
fabulous journey in an imaginary land called Oz. The beginning and the ending in the real world certainly make the
dream more meaningful than it would’ve otherwise been, but without the long dream the film would’ve been a very
different film to say the least, and inevitably much less interesting without all the magic. Such influential works
inspired many more similar projects.
The 23-minute animated film titled 1001 Nights (1998) starts directly with the narrator’s voice saying “Let us then
dream.” And in that dream, which is the film itself, what can be seen are only a dreaming princess and her dream.
The dream begins right after the film begins and the film ends right after the dream ends. The film is nearly a pure
dream. There’s no “real story” being told in other words, but there still is an imaginary reality where the dream is
being dreamt. So in this case there is no significant relation of the dreams to something that can be called a filmic
reality, because the filmic reality is already presented as something unreal. Ten Nights of Dreams (2006) is another
film which mainly consists of a disconnected collection of dreams, but a basis filmic reality is still present even if it
doesn’t seem to have any relevance to dreams whatsoever.
In another animated film, The Triplets of Belleville (2003) there are a few dream sequences which are very short and
appear to be totally irrelevant to the plot: they’re just interesting for other reasons. Similar examples can be found in
Big Lebowski and Pee Wee’s Big Adventure (1985).
In those moments, when the audience is taken into the characters’ dream worlds, the story temporarily becomes the
dream itself. Although these dreams do not appear to be directly related to the story, or having any influence on the
plot, they inform the audience further about the inner world of the characters they may care about. The desired effect
may be to strengthen the audience’s emotional reaction to an event which really happens in the movie at some point
or it may also be solely about enjoying the dream’s interesting content.
8
The dreams in books and other forms of storytelling are also no different in that regard.
In Akira Kurosawa’s Dreams (1990) there is something else that is philosophically interesting. It’s a collection of 9
real dreams of Kurosawa, turned into short films. There’s a text that says “I once had a dream…” at the beginning of
the film and then the film jumps into filmed versions of the director’s real-life dreams. In this case it is clear that the
dreams aren’t dreamt in an alternative reality; Kurosawa says that these dreams source directly from our own reality,
directly from his mind, from a real person. It’s just a direct communication of real dreams. And if there’s a “real
story” these dreams should shed some light on, as in most movies, then this story is the real-world Kurosawa’s and
accordingly humanity’s real story. If the content of the dreams are supposed to have an influence on a wider “plot”,
they’ve obviously influenced Akira Kurosawa’s real life in a way that caused him to make a feature film about them.
And since they’ve been turned into films and publicized, they therefore influence the plot of the real lives of many
real humans too: The audience and all the people spending time watching, writing, reading things about Kurosawa’s
Dreams, and many who are indirectly influenced by it all, albeit minimally.
But of course dreams are not always that disconnected from a filmic narration of a fictional story.
2.2.2. General Narrative Purposes
The reason for depicting a dream can be one related to traditional storytelling. For example dreams and visions are
often used to “disguise” flashbacks. In many films characters seem to dream about past events. Even if this happens
during their sleep they are usually still shown in a way that’s not too dreamlike as can be seen in Minority Report
(2002) or Manchurian Candidate (1962).
But there are also interesting examples of how flashbacks can be disguised as dreams: Spellbound (1945) opens with
a text explaining that the story “deals with psychoanalysis” and continues to state that opening the locked doors of
the mind of a patient -to release the disturbing complexes behind- solves the mental problems.9 What happens in the
film is that a man who doesn’t remember anything about his past is trying to figure out his apparent connection to a
murder. His recurring dream is one of the most important pieces of the puzzle and every shot in the dream sequence
has a significant symbolic meaning (see section 2.3.6. Contextual Design for more on symbols). Thanks to the
psychoanalysts the mystery behind all the symbols can be revealed, which cures the patient and he remembers
everything again.
One interesting aspect of the dream sequence in Spellbound is that the audience doesn’t get to see the dream while
the character is dreaming it, but it is presented as he’s telling about his dream to the psychoanalysts.10 It’s almost
like a reenactment of the dream, or its flashback; a flashback of a flashback that is told in form of a dream with
symbols.
Similar connections between storytelling and their visual depictions also exist in films like Millennium Actress
(2001), The Big Fish (2003), The Wild (2006) and The Fall (2006) where an older character tells a story to a
younger one, rather than a dream. But such sceneries have a lot in common with dreams because they depict
imaginary tales where many surreal elements are mixed with the characters’ real lives. In a way the tale being told
draws both characters into a daydream. And especially in the case of The Fall the tale being told and shown is very
9
Interestingly Hitchcock later refers to his Spellbound as “just another manhunt story wrapped up in pseudo-
psychoanalysis.” (Hitchcock - Revised Edition by François Truffaut [1985, p. 165])
10
The same thing happens in Open Your Eyes (1997) too, but it happens within a dream. And the guy inside the
dream unknowingly describes something that really happened.
much improvised and dependent on the characters’ thoughts at the time of the telling. It is similar to a lucid
dreaming experience where the dreamer is aware that it is a dream, and can consciously manipulate the content of
the dream.
In many other cases the dreams’ primary purpose in films is to reveal more about a character’s inner nature and
feelings, even if it doesn’t affect the story as dramatically as in Spellbound. In Ingmar Bergman’s Wild Strawberries
(1957) the old protagonist’s dreams, flashbacks and fantasies don’t help him solve a crime but he rather reevaluates
his life through an interior journey of self-discovery.
In Brazil (1985) the dreams of the protagonist accompany him throughout the entire film to make the audience
understand his innermost desires and struggles more clearly. What happens in his dreams constitute a parallel
storyline to what’s really happening in the film. His dream-self goes through a symbolic version of the same things
he experiences in his real life.
In the screen adaptation of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984) it is shown how the protagonist,
overwhelmed by the darkness and hopelessness of the world he’s living in, regularly escapes to a calming, pastoral
environment in his dreams. Later in the movie, as he’s tortured and as the suffering reaches unbearable levels his
dreams also reflect how he gives in to the extremely oppressive authorities. His place of escape eventually seizes to
be an innocent place and at the end he no longer visits it.
Instead of showing a character laughing, crying or reacting in any other imaginable way to a certain situation in the
filmic reality, showing variations of these within the characters’ dreams and imaginations is what these scenes are
commonly used for. It can add depth to simple emotions and provides an opportunity for both explaining complex
emotional processes more in detail -instead of superficially showing the facial expression of a character for
example- and also making it all look much more interesting.
What follows will be a closer look at a few of the more specific and common themes that can be encountered in
filmic dreams. For example with all the freedom the dreamers have, it is common to see cases of wish fulfillment
and various fantasies in dreams.
2.2.3. Wish Fulfillment and Fantasy
At the beginning of Disney’s Cinderella (1950) two birds fly to her room and wake up Cinderella, but she refuses to
tell them about her dream saying/singing: “If you tell a wish it won’t come true. And after all a dream is a wish your
heart makes…”11 It appears that she isn’t the only one to think so, because dreams picturing wishes and fantasies are
very common in films.
One basic form of wish fulfillment is the act of flying and it’s often seen in dreams. Since the laws of nature within
dreams are not necessarily the same as in reality, flight is a suitable choice for directly demonstrating that freedom.
11
The filmmakers don’t directly tell or show Cinderella’s dream either. But presumably she dreams about what later
happens in the film, which means her wish/dream probably came true, because she lives “happily ever after”
according to the final statement in the film. So the script is written in a way that is loyal to and supportive of
Cinderella’s belief that not telling about one’s dream indeed makes a difference, which is not too uninteresting in
terms of storytelling.
Fellini’s 8½ (1954) begins with a dream where the protagonist escapes his car (which is stuck in the traffic) and he
ascends into the sky. In Brazil the protagonist Sam dreams of himself as an angelic knight with mechanical wings,
gloriously flying over the clouds. In Paprika (2006) the protagonist flies on a small cloud in her dream, like some
sort of a sorcerer, and later in the dream she also turns into a fairy and starts flying in that form. In both the Big
Lebowski and Science of Sleep the dreamers float over a city landscape with ease, as if swimming through the air.
Such examples indicate a sense of supernatural power –much like angels- and a certain convenience for the dreamer.
When flying they can see things from a much higher perspective and travel a lot faster and more freely than they
could’ve by foot.
But characters usually desire more than just flying of course. In 8½, a film about filmmaking, the director Guido is
struggling to live up to the expectations to make a good film and he’s also overwhelmed by the social complexities
related to the women around him. He fantasizes about having a modern form of harem filled with all the women in
his life where they all admire and pamper him. As the “king” of his harem he’s even prepared to tame the women
with his whip if they tend to behave “badly”. Apart from that, later in the movie he also commits an imaginary
suicide when the pressure on him as a director gets too high; a fulfillment of a darker wish.
In High Fidelity (2000) and Requiem for a Dream (2000) characters seem to briefly imagine committing acts of
absurd violence against someone they dislike when in fact they’re just silently –but angrily- standing in front of the
disliked person.
Brazil’s Sam is always pursuing his love in his dreams. When things go wrong in his real life he gets disconnected
from reality and loses himself in his pleasant dreams. Science of Sleep’s Stephane dreams about many odd things,
some of which also inevitably reflect his wishes and fantasies about women and his career. “The Dude” from Big
Lebowski has his own uniquely bizarre fantasy where his passion for women, bowling and music is combined in an
odd way. In the black comedy Happiness (1998) a middle-aged psychiatrist has a recurring dream where he calmly
goes to a park with a machine gun and serenely starts to shoot people. The pleasure he gets from doing that is such
that he says that after waking up he gets “very depressed because [he’s] living in reality” instead of that dream
where he can happily shoot people.
Another unusual example for a wish fulfillment dream can be seen in one of Pixar’s early animated shorts Red’s
Dream (1987) where a unicycle dreams of being the star of a circus when it’s actually just sadly sitting in a bike
shop and hoping to be bought by somebody.
In sum, straying from the filmic reality to communicate the desires of characters is a widely used technique. Dream
sequences and similar scenes can be effectively put into use even for communicating the most absurd fantasies,
which would often be impossible or difficult to do otherwise. In so doing such dream sequences help explain the
dreamers’ motivations for their actions in their filmic real life and add depth to the story.
In contrast with various forms of wish fulfillment, there are also the infamous nightmares; the fulfillment of fears in
dreams.
2.2.4. Nightmares
When the emotional outcome of a dream is clearly unpleasant for the dreamer then such negative dreams are usually
described as nightmares. Sometimes the discomfort reaches such a high degree that the dreamer wakes up from the
dream.
The emotion of fear often plays a big role in films since it’s a part of the excitement that is usually preferred to be
presented in films, rather than a familiar slice of common daily life. Since new and exciting events are more
memorable and are also perceived to be more share-worthy than regular, common events, this is also reflected in
films and filmic dreams. Accordingly nightmares can be frequently seen in films, due to their dramatic value. In
comparison dreams of less dramatic nature, e.g. purely pleasant dreams, are more difficult to encounter. 12
Today the most popular treatment of filmic nightmares is arguably with Freddy Kruger from A Nightmare on Elm
Street (1984) and all its sequels. The main premise of the movie is that the mysterious and scary “Freddy” character,
who is actually supposed to be a long-dead child murderer, surfaces in teenagers’ nightmares, through which he can
somehow influence the real life and violently murder real people. Although Freddy doesn’t directly represent his
victims’ specific fears in their waking life, he is designed in a stereotypically horrifying way (disfigured psychopath
with a metal-clawed glove, odd abilities and unconventional tendencies). He doesn’t have any difficulty scaring all
his victims “to death” even if they’ve never known him before, because his image and actions resonate with certain
universal fears present in humans. In an interview the director Wes Craven, creator of Freddy and the Elm Street
series, states that while designing Freddy’s metal claw he was “looking for a primal fear which is embedded in the
subconscious of people of all cultures… the claw of an animal, like a saber-toothed tiger reaching with it's
tremendous hooks. I transposed this into a human hand.”13 In other words it doesn’t matter whose dream Freddy
haunts for the typical audience to be able to understand and relate to the victims’ fears.
In comparison to that, the horror Pee-wee experiences in his nightmare in Pee-wee’s Big Adventure (1985) in
reaction to what a few people in clown-like appearance do with a red bike would be harder to understand if one
doesn’t know enough about what Pee-wee is like and what he went through.
Nightmare sequences such as in A Nightmare on Elm Street series (1984-1994) are often filled with a lot of tension
and action. That emotional intensity and sense of adventure are the primary functions of nightmare sequences in
some horror films, rather than presenting information about the inner world of a character in order to make what
happens in the filmic reality more understandable and feel richer. In such situations, where the nightmare sequence
is treated like a mini horror/action film, the difference between the real world and the dream world is of no critical
consequence on an emotional level, especially if it’s not shown as “just” a dream and presented as real. Whatever is
chosen to be presented on screen is accepted to be true in that moment. The vagueness or the flexibility of the
boundaries between reality and nightmares in certain films makes what takes place in the nightmares no less
important than what happens in the filmic reality (See section 2.2.5. Reality vs. Dream for more).
Not all nightmares use totally stereotypical and non-specific fears to scare. Outside the horror genre the nightmare
sequences are often more representative of the dreamer’s psyche and the fear elements become specific to the
dreamer’s life and personality. Sometimes what is depicted in filmic nightmares are the characters’ worries about
the future. Nightmares with apocalyptic visions can be quite disturbing (Terminator 2 [1991], Terminator 3 [2003],
12
On overage people report more negative dream contents than positive ones in real life too. (Valli, K., Strandholm,
T., Sillanmäki, L., and Revonsuo, A. (2008), Dreams are more negative than real life: Implications for the function
of dreaming )
13
Source: http://nightmareonelmstreetfilms.com/nightmareinterviewswes.html (Accessed on September 2009)
“Creating Freddy: A Talk with Wes Craven” by William Schoell (From: Nightmare Never Ends: Official Story of
Freddy Krueger and the "Nightmare on Elm Street" Films, 1992, William Schoell, James Spencer)
Watchmen [2009]). But what concerns a character playing an independent film director most can instead be just
everything going wrong on the set of a low-budget film (Living in Oblivion [1995]). A Scottish Noble who betrayed
William Wallace can have a nightmare about Wallace coming nearer and nearer to him with an angry facial
expression (Braveheart [1995]) and a racing car can fear losing the big race and ending up among tractors in its
nightmare (Cars [2006]).
In addition to fear of bad future scenarios, characters can also have anxieties about their past experiences. In The
Manchurian Candidate (1962) a group of men are having nightmares about a traumatic experience they were
hypnotized to forget, like an uncomfortable flashback. In Flatliners (1990) characters’ intense feelings of guilt are
disturbingly revealed in their minds when they have near-death experiences. In Paprika (2006) a cop is having
nightmares because he never finished a film that he started making with an old friend of his.
Nightmares often result in the dreamers waking up on their own due to the intensity of fear. That also indicates that
the most disturbing part of a nightmare has to be at the end, even outside nightmares with Freddy Kruger where the
characters usually seem to wake up after Freddy physically attacks and hurts them. When what the dreamers
experience in their dreams becomes unbearable, then the act of awakening becomes a protection against the dream
content; an instant transportation away from the dangerous realm into the calm reality.
2.2.5. Reality vs. Dream
Dreams are also often used to play with the audience’s sense of reality and to confuse them about what is real. One
relatively simple and popular way to do this is to start a film directly with a dream sequence so that the audience
doesn’t have a chance to judge whether or not what they’re watching would fit into the film’s reality. Because video
is a time-based medium, normally the viewer is only exposed to a single frame at a time, unlike experiencing a
painting where the viewer can choose how to interact with it. In films the whole “picture” becomes apparent only at
the end of the film, and even that picture is formed only in the viewer’s mind, based on his/her memory of what has
been communicated throughout the entire film. The viewer is bound to the linear flow of the medium.
So unless the viewers are prepared and already expecting the films to show them only half-truths (e.g. not making
clear beforehand that what is shown is just a character’s dream) they’re likely to temporarily assume that the film
actually started by showing something that really belongs to the filmic reality. Since statistically the percentage of
films that start so deceivingly is quite low, the majority of the viewers are not likely to have such expectations. So
presumably most viewers tend to suspend their disbelief at the action right from the very start of a film and react
accordingly, which means that they end up mistaking a filmic dream for the filmic reality.
Concealing that what happened in the film was just the product of the imagination of a character, until the filmic
dream ends, also results in the dream sequence being judged in a different context than it otherwise would be. Just as
real people in the real world take their own real lives more seriously than what they see in films, the things that
belong to a film’s reality may in a way also be taken more seriously than what doesn’t really happen in a film, and
the “real” events can be considered relatively more important. If the viewers are not aware that what they’re
watching isn’t actually going to affect the filmic reality as dramatically as it would have if it were really happening
in the filmic reality (instead of just being filmic dreams) then they’re likely to react to what they see more strongly.
Not knowing that a character who is seemingly in extreme danger and pain actually lies on a comfortable bed makes
it easier to care about the apparent pain and danger. This means that it becomes easier for the viewer to empathize
with what a character is going through, or at least what a character seems to believe he/she is going through.
A few examples for films that start with a dream only to later reveal the dream sequence for what it was are Total
Recall (1990), The Cell (2000), Paprika (2006), Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001), Fellini’s 8½ (1954) and
some of the films from the Nightmare on Elm Street series.
If the dream –or at least its beginning- is not visibly too contrasting to the reality of the film, or if the transition
between the two is smooth enough, a dream can also be introduced without warning at any point in the film and still
manage to confuse the audience, at least temporarily.
In Disney’s famous book adaptation Alice in Wonderland (1951) there is no clear sign given to show when Alice’s
dream starts. What happens is that while she’s happily singing and dancing around, she spots a talking rabbit. She
follows him and enters the Wonderland through a rabbit hole. Only at the very end of the film it is revealed that
Alice was asleep the whole time and her fantastic adventure took place only in her dream. In The Wizard of Oz
(1939) the situation is similar, but not as deceiving as in Alice. Because this time the protagonist, Dorothy, is seen
on screen when falling asleep. What may make the audience believe that her fabulous adventure is really happening
is that at the beginning of her dream she seems to wake up in the same spot where she fell asleep. So the transition
between reality and the dream is not too obvious. Characters who seem to wake up when they’re actually just
entering their dream can be commonly seen in films.
A film about independent filmmaking, Living in Oblivion (1995), starts out as the members of a film crew get up in
the morning and prepare themselves for shooting a scene. But everything goes wrong and they can’t even get one
shot. Finally the director bursts with anger, starts insulting his entire crew and then wakes up to realize that it was
just a nightmare. This dream goes on for longer than 20 minutes in the film. Then the director heads to the set for the
real shooting and the film crew can’t get a single shot this time either, because of completely different reasons. But
after 30 minutes it is revealed that all that was also a dream, this time it was the dream of the actress. After that she
goes to the real set and ironically they start shooting a dream sequence, and this time it isn’t anybody’s dream.14 But
at that stage, after having observed two deception attempts, the average viewer can’t help but being a little paranoid
about the rest of the film, which is possibly something the writer/director Tom DiCillo was anticipating at the time
of writing.
In the science fiction film Open Your Eyes (1997) and its remake Vanilla Sky (2001) there is also no visible sign that
lets the audience know where the reality ends and the dream begins. As the protagonist doesn’t know what is going
on either, the viewers share his confusion throughout the entire film. The exact storyline and the nature of reality
become clear only at the very end.
There’s a similar twist in Brazil too. The film has a dramatic ending where a significant portion of the film turns out
to be the protagonist’s fantasy, who apparently finally lost his mind completely because of the insane bureaucratic
system he’s forced to live in. Once the dream sequence is over the audience is thrown out of the delusion back into
the bleak reality. Due to the striking contrast of reality with the happy ending in the protagonist’s fantasy the typical
viewer is likely to feel sorry for him instead of sharing his deluded happiness. Similarly, Jacob’s Ladder (1990) and
Stay (2005) both feature a character losing himself in a confusing mixture of memories and dreams, when in reality
he’s badly wounded and about to die.
Films like Identity (2003) and Fight Club (1999) show things through the viewpoint of a character with dissociative
14
Except that it is arguably the dream of the real-world filmmakers.
identity disorder (multiple personality disorder), consequently many of the things shown are actually only in the
character’s mind. But since this is not readily observable until the end of the film, it results in a false sense of reality.
In Total Recall, right at the happy end of the film, the audience is again forced to consider the possibility that the
whole adventure may have just been a dream when the last thing the protagonist says to his lover is “I just had a
terrible thought: What if this is a dream?”.
In Waking Life (2001) what is real, or if anything at all is real, is even more unclear. The film ends like it all might
have been the lucid dream of the protagonist, but it’s never clarified. It is rather a philosophical exploration of
various ideas and is not meant to have a logical, reality-like continuity and structure.
This notion of reality’s boundaries not being clearly defined, or the boundaries being explicitly flexible, is
sometimes referred to as “rubber reality”. Such examples demonstrate that the glimpses into the potentially-
imaginary realms provided by films are not enough to conclusively verify the realness of all that is presented in a
film. Not in every film are there intended clear answers. Filmmakers don’t hesitate to tell paradoxical or ambiguous
stories. Not all films can necessarily be rationalized with the logic and laws characteristic of the everyday reality.
The final example is Wes Craven’s New Nightmare (1994): As earlier mentioned, the Nightmare on Elm Street
series features a dream stalker named Freddy as a villain. His supernatural powers enable him to enter the film’s
reality through characters’ nightmares and this alone blurs the line between the imaginary and the real. Yet in the
seventh film of the series, New Nightmare, which is the only other film directed by the creator and director of the
first film, Wes Craven, this elusiveness rises to an extreme: What happens is that Freddy, after being “officially
killed” in the sixth film, is revealed to be “this ancient thing”15 that was held captive in the form of the Freddy
Krueger character throughout the six films. But he is set free after his death in the sixth film because the story has
ended and he is now haunting the film crew who worked/is working on the Nightmare on Elm Street films. His
primary goal is killing the real-world actress Heather Langenkamp who played the protagonist Nancy in the first and
the third film, at the end of which she was killed by Freddy.
In addition to the traditional mixing-together of the film’s nightmares and reality throughout the film, this film blurs
the line between the filmic reality and the true reality too. Within the New Nightmare, the film’s real writer/director
Wes Craven is playing himself and he is shown while writing the film he is in, based supposedly on his prophecy-
like “real” nightmares. At one point he says “I think the only way to stop [Freddy] is to make another movie”
inevitably referencing the movie he’s playing in, as if it was really made to stop Freddy. Whether or not Heather
Langenkamp wants it she’s forced to play Nancy and fight Freddy again because the film conquers her real life.
Things that happened in previous movies this time “really” happen to her. Towards the end of the film she somehow
finds the finished script of the movie within the nightmare, she opens a random page towards the end, and starts
reading the following from the script:
“The more she read the more she realized what she had in her hands was nothing more or less than her life
itself. That everything she experienced and thought was bound within these pages. There was no movie.
There was only… her… life.”
So the film isn’t only self-referencing while pretending to document the reality, it’s also using this twisted structure
15
Wes Craven’s line in the film while he’s playing himself.
against the characters in the film –who are supposedly real people- to increase tension, and all of that is happening
through dreams or in dreams, within a film.
On top of all that, along with Wes Craven and Heather Langenkamp, also both Freddy Krueger and the actor Robert
Englund who always played Freddy are credited as having played themselves, as if Freddy Krueger is a real person.
In a way this is a multi-textured mockumentary filmed as some kind of horror film; a fake documentary pretending
to be presenting the reality when in fact it is extremely unreal. Obviously this unique plot does more than making
the audience question the boundary between filmic dreams and filmic reality; it also introduces real dreams and the
true reality into the picture and ends up raising some interesting questions.
The self-referencing mockumentary style can actually be used independent from any filmic dreams but the layers
added by the dream aspect makes it more intriguing and sophisticated. Freddy enters through filmic dreams not only
into the filmic reality, but supposedly also into the real reality. If the earlier films can be regarded as dreams of real
people from the real world (filmmakers) and this one as a documentary, then the double-transition of Freddy is
uniquely interesting.
All these examples demonstrate that the notion of dreams provide plenty of opportunities for coming up with
intriguing, thought-provoking premises in films. They help the viewers question and ironically understand the nature
of the reality better.
2.2.6. Other
What follows are a few unique cases which can’t easily be put into categories but deserve mentioning. They are
interesting for different reasons:
In Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), where the main character Joel’s memories are being erased from
his mind while he’s asleep and dreaming, his doctor earlier explains to him that by the time he wakes up in the
morning the targeted memories will be gone “as in a dream upon waking”. 16 During the process Joel goes back and
forth between unconsciously living the dream and being consciously aware of the dream. He’s jumping from one
memory to the other and watches the memories that are related to his girlfriend Clementine disappear one by one.
Eventually he comes to realize that some memories are just too precious to forget and regrets his decision. He wants
to cancel the erasure process, but unfortunately he can’t wake up and tell the technicians to stop it. From that point
on he struggles to save a few memories of his girlfriend: At first he’s in panic and all he can think of is to hold her
hand and to run to someplace else in his mind. But he only jumps from one memory with her to another. So the
computer, which has a map of all of his memories with Clementine in it, tracks them wherever they go and erases
the memory, along with Clementine. After a while, realizing that this strategy isn’t working well, he stops to think.
In his dream he starts to chat with his girlfriend about the problem and she comes up with the idea 17 that she should
be hidden in a memory which actually doesn’t have anything to do with her. So Joel takes her back to her childhood
memories, which, he assumes, should be safe from the erasing machine because they aren’t a part of the electronic
16
The film is referencing the view that for most people their dreams are hard to remember; as soon as the person
wakes up it’s as if the dream never occurred. It doesn’t matter if the person was totally convinced that he/she was
really living the dream while dreaming.
17
Joel imagines that Clementine comes up with the idea, although his mind is actually doing the thinking.
map the computer has. Although this causes the technicians some trouble, they still get to remove Clementine from
those memories too. When all of it is over Joel appears to have failed at keeping any of his memories with his
girlfriend in them. When he finally wakes up all that is left is an inexplicable, seemingly irrational urge to visit the
place where they first met without him even knowing why he’s going there.
This is an excellent example for taking advantage of the flexible nature of dreaming. During that entire chaotic
struggle in Joel’s mind, while the memories disappear one by one -starting from the most recent ones and going
towards the earliest memories of the couple- the viewers are informed about the development of their entire
relationship in a uniquely entertaining way. First the viewers get to understand why their relationship reached a
point where they want to erase each other from their minds, they see the good times and the bad times the couple
had, they get to know both characters much more in detail, and it becomes clear how much they mean to each other
and why they don’t want to completely forget each other. This narrative style informs the viewers both about Joel’s
past and his present thoughts and feelings, because Joel is conscious of the fact that he’s dreaming his way through
his memories, even if he doesn’t have full control over the flow of the dream. He relives his memories and at the
same time thinks, talks, acts with his actual consciousness and affects the direction of the dream and appears to
modify his memories while reliving them, which leads to some interesting scenes in the film.
Another case where a filmic dream seems to serve a uniquely interesting purpose is the Director’s Cut version of the
science fiction film Blade Runner (Original Release 1985, Director’s Cut 1992). The director Ridley Scott’s version
features a very short dream sequence which dramatically affects the audience’s interpretation of a significant
element of the story. A dream with a unicorn throws in the question that the main character, Deckard, may be a
“replicate” –a synthetic adult human with artificial memories- rather than a real human with a real past. 18 Apart from
the direct implication on the story, this distinction also creates room for extra ethical and philosophical questions
regarding the meaning or significance of being a real human and humans’ relationship with potential future synthetic
life forms.
Although Ridley Scott insists that he always intended the protagonist to secretly be a replicate, interestingly there
still seems to be some disagreement on this point among those who worked on the film. 19 The actor who played
Deckard, Harrison Ford, and the screenwriter of the film, Hampton Fancher seem to disagree with Scott’s view that
Deckard is a replicate. Even if this ambiguity caused by the unicorn dream may result in everyone believing
completely different things, the addition of it manages to add another layer of mystery to the film and leaves
unanswered questions, hypothetical answers of which provoke even more significant questions. In a way a subtle
complexity like this enables the filmmakers to tell two significantly different stories at the same time, because the
viewer is manipulated to consider both scenarios with all their philosophical implications. This twist might make the
movie more memorable for the audience –also for the film crew apparently- and arguably more successful for the
filmmakers because of that.
The last example is from the animated feature Horton Hears a Who (2008). There is a scene in the film where
Horton the elephant seems to falsely believe that he’s falling down a bridge when in reality he isn’t moving at all.
18
This is the case because later in the movie it is indicated that certain type of replicates may have this unicorn
dream implanted in their minds. A character who isn’t close enough to know about Deckard’s dreams seems to be
aware of his unicorn dream, which implies that Deckard is a replicate and that he has information on Deckard’s
origins; i.e. which model Deckard is and how the mind of that particular replicate model was designed.
19
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Themes_in_Blade_Runner (Accessed on September 2009)
This delusion of Horton’s is not shown directly through his perspective but because of the tricky editing and
camerawork the audience is still led to believe that he is indeed falling. Basically what is shown on screen is a close-
up of Horton’s face where he yells in panic as if he’s falling down. In that moment the viewer isn’t exposed to any
more visual information than that; no visual reference is presented in the background that should indicate that
Horton is immobile. Also with the addition of a traditional falling-down sound effect the deception is successful.
The truth is revealed as the camera slowly moves back. This is an example where the filmmakers “cheat” to take the
audience into a character’s imagination, without really leaving the filmic reality. The way Horton’s intense fear is
conveyed is artistically rare, if not unique. It shows how fearful expectations can trigger a character’s imagination
and force him/her to reach false conclusions, even if very briefly. And this scene informs the audience further about
Horton’s personality, in addition to being interesting on its own.
Altogether dreams in various forms can serve many different purposes, some of them very complex some of them
very simple. The mystery of real dreams is not likely to completely disappear anytime soon. So films that can really
take advantage of their ambiguity by stretching the audience’s mind about what dreams can be and what they may
mean will not cease to be interesting anytime soon.
2.3. Visuals
Dream sequences in films tend to have certain atmospheric characteristics which distinguish them from the film’s
reality. Certain moods and visual representations are perceived to be more “dreamlike” in modern culture. To reach
that quality filmmakers make use of colors, lights, speed of time, art of movement, objects with certain associations
and various visual and aural properties.
Ignoring those dreams in films which are not visually distinguishable from the filmic reality, this chapter focuses on
the distinctive visual characteristics of filmic dreams. In order to form a basis for the examination, various
categories have been chosen for different types of visual characteristics based on the frequency and the significance
of their occurrence. Categories are as follows: Transitions, Blur and Visual Vagueness, Time and Motion, Fog and
Clouds, Color and Look, and finally Contextual Design.
2.3.1. Transitions
Filmmakers use many different techniques when switching from the filmic reality into the filmic dreams, and vice
versa. Sometimes it is as simple as a regular cut, which doesn’t even necessarily give away that a transition took
place. It can be a simple zoom into or out from the closed eye or some roundish, bright objects, fade in/out, a brief
blur, a little distortion and so on. But instead of those, or in addition to those, sometimes a lot of value and effort are
put on the idea of switching between the two realms. The aim here is to highlight various approaches that can be
considered visually more interesting through examples, and not a general historical analysis.
Certain transition examples that seem to stand out from the majority will be mentioned below, in order to give a
general idea about the creative spectrum of dream-related transition techniques.
One of the classical methods used for a transition into filmic dreams is the tunnel-like fast motion effect, as if a long
journey is made from one place to another with extreme speed. Such sequences tend to be visually remarkable with
a lot of bright colors and overwhelming motion. (Fig. 3) The look of such sequences can still differ significantly, the
possibilities are theoretically endless, but the conveyed general feeling is one of a fantastic trip through time and
space.
Figure 3: Two examples of a tunnel-like transition into a dream. The frame on the left is from Dreamscapes (1984)
and the one on the right from The Cell (2000).
A similar effect can also be obtained by extremely fast editing. Showing flashes of distinctly different frames for
very short periods of time (i.e. 1/24 of a second) can visually overwhelm and absorb the viewer similar to tunnel-
like effects.
In Flatliners (1990) one dream sequence seems to combine both methods, and more: It starts with a very short and
subtle tunnel-like transition -by diving into the image of a blue, glowing eye- and then a gradually fastening
sequence of images follows (from the character’s adulthood into childhood). It suddenly stops, after getting as fast
as technically possible, by showing a pulsing human embryo in the womb, followed by peaceful landscape shots.
The contextually more significant part of the dream starts only after that introduction.
In Blueberry (2004) there are multiple transitions between various stages of the intense dream/hallucination the
protagonist experiences and the sequence features also a combination of various transition effects, starting with the
increasing superimposition of the animated hallucination layers onto the layer of the live-action footage.
In Buster Keaton’s Sherlock, Jr. (1924) the protagonist -a film projectionist (and janitor) who wants to be a
detective- falls asleep. As he enters his dream a second ghost-like version of him seems to wake up exactly from the
position he’s sleeping in. There are two versions of Buster Keaton on screen: one that is asleep and one that just
woke up and is slightly transparent. And the dream-version even tries to wake up the sleeping version to no avail. So
the dream is almost portrayed like an out-of-body experience, instead of a dream that takes place in a different
location or time. But the main part of the dream starts when the dreamy Buster Keaton decides to enter the film that
is being projected on the big screen. Only with that second transition the dream begins to defy reality more
intensely. Regarding the transition from the dream back to reality: Before Buster Keaton wakes up, the dream-
version doesn’t come back from the film projected on screen and return to the body. Rather the real-version just falls
down from the chair he was sleeping on and wakes up. The out-of-bodyness of the dream experience ends right
there.
Even if it’s not always exactly like in Sherlock, Jr., entering the filmic dream with the dreamer appearing to wake up
at the start of a dream is not uncommon in films. Similar examples can also be seen in The Cell (2000), in the
Nightmare on Elm Street series, Fantasia (1940), Toy Story 2 (1999) and in Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within
(2001). Unlike in Sherlock, Jr., The Cell and Fantasia the out-of-body experience is usually not a part of the
representation though: The dreamer just seems to wake up without being aware of having entered a dream, and
without any obvious visual sign being given to the viewer. This approach also serves the function of temporarily
concealing the fact that what happens is not real, as discussed in the earlier chapters.
And like in Sherlock, Jr. where the dreamer’s dream version enters into the film (which is being projected onto the
cinema screen within the filmic dream), an interesting transition into a second level of dreaming can also be seen in
The Science of Sleep (2006). In it the dreamer seems to first enter a light dream state (sometimes also when awake)
where he’s in a strange TV studio preparing the dream he wants, and then he enters a second stage of more dynamic
dreaming through the blue screen at the back of studio, as if being composited into a film (Fig. 1). He stands in front
of the blue screen, he disappears and then finds himself within the dream he prepared in his lighter dreaming state
(in the TV studio). This choice of transition seems to humorously acknowledge the intimacy between dreams and
filmmaking.
In Rosemary’s Baby (1968), the protagonist is drugged and only half-asleep when dreaming. Because she’s not
completely unconscious and disconnected from reality her dream gets mixed up with it: When her husband
undresses her she talks to him but imagines at the same time that they’re constantly changing locations. And she still
perceives certain strange things really happening around her but thinks it’s all a dream, until the end where it feels
real enough to make her say “This is no dream, this is really happening!”, yet she still drifts back into the dream
before waking up. So in this case a full transition never occurs but there is an irregular gradual transformation; first
into the dream and then out.
The dream sequence in The Fall (2006) begins after the dreamer, a little girl, falls down and becomes unconscious.
Then the first thing she sees is her father dressed as the character from the story she’s been listening to prior to her
fall and he is falling exactly the way she did, only in slow motion and in a surreal realm. What then follows is a
striking representation of a mixture of her memories, feelings and the story she was being told. The scenery in the
background changes non-stop, but the continuity and the close associations of various figures’ positions and actions
stitches the sequence together, which otherwise would’ve been relatively incomprehensible. For example although
the general look may drastically change from one second to another, there is a consistent imagery of one figure
attacking a character lying on the ground in four different variations: First a gladiator attacking another with his
sword, then an Eskimo stabbing another with a spear, then a knight chopping off another’s leg and then a cowboy
shooting a man. All of that happens within approximately 5 seconds. These quick transitions reflect the associative
nature and the relative instability of dreams.
The transition out of the dream sequence in The Fall is interesting for other reasons: What seems to have really
happened after the little girl fell is represented in the dream form at the end of her long dream. The doctors
examining her injuries, taking her head’s X-ray and things like that apparently penetrate her unconsciousness and
are projected into her dream in a symbolic way. Using stop-motion animation the doctors are represented as strange
priest-like figures in long robes, she as a plastic doll, and the entire medical treatment process is represented like a
dark ritual. She wakes up in the real world after they are through with her in her dream.
Such transitions out of the dream, where the reality seems to leak into the dream right before the end, are usually
much less visual, and more sound-based instead.20
Figure 4: Two frames from “Stay”. On the left side two characters standing on the bridge are visible. The hazy
stripes are already affecting the look of the scenery. On the right: the close-up of a character at the most dreamy
moment, right before the end of the dream.
In Stay (2005), towards end of the imaginary part of the film, everything continually gets vaguer until the imaginary
reality completely dissolves. Close to the end of that part, strange waves of hazy stripes start invading the scenery.
They fuzz the colors on screen and also seem to distort or displace the look of objects behind them. After a while
they get a more smoke-like quality and also start emitting light and colors more intensely. (Fig.4) At the very end of
the dream, there is a white flash and the dreamer’s body turns into glowing “smoke”. The light emitted from the
smoke-like thing morphs into the light of the flashlight that is being held into the character’s eyes in the real world
and after that brief blurry morph process the film continues in the filmic reality.
This is a stylish combination of various effects and an impressive ending for the dream part. That the dream
becomes so dreamlike only at the very end creates a dramatic contrast too.
But Stay also features many internal visual transitions throughout the dream itself. Different times, locations and
realities are mixed together by playing with the size of objects, lights, through close-ups in combination with careful
editing, morphing and so on, but often also by using objects that already associate a certain transition. This means
that the camera focuses at the moment of transition on objects like windows, doors, and screens. This results in the
transitions appearing smoother than an arbitrary morph or jump between two frames would’ve been. It’s a visually
intriguing way to increase the fluidity of the film, which is often a desired property of filmic dreams.
Otherwise stylistic morphs between distinctly different images as in Hulk (2003), where a combination of distortion,
dissolve and particle effects are used, are also visually significant.
2.3.2. Blur and Visual Vagueness
Usually dreams are regarded as being visually more vague and unclear than humans’ perception of reality. This is
also reflected in films. Various blur effects can be commonly seen in dream sequences.
In fact it is apparently so common that in a 1963 interview Hitchcock says that he didn’t want to “resort to the old-
fashioned blurry edged and so forth” look when shooting the dream sequences in Spellbound (1945) and he doesn’t
sound like he’s impressed by the look of John Huston’s Freud (1962) where the blurry edged look was used during
20
As in Living in Oblivion (1995) where the protagonist can’t find the source of an annoying sound, only to wake up
and realize that his alarm clock was what disturbed his dream.
dreamy flashback sequences. Instead, he says that he wanted to make his dream sequences “needle-sharp, compared
with the rest of the picture”, which was “slightly diffused”, so that he can create a “vivid dream”. He also states that
he “wanted to work with Dali because of the architectural sharpness of his work.” 21
Whether a filmmaker chooses to create a sharper look or a blurry one, in both instances there’s an attempt to create a
look that sets the dream apart from the rest of the movie and a regular film look. The complexity of these artistic
decisions makes it difficult to pinpoint why exactly they’re made the way they’re made, but it seems that many
modern filmmakers also refrain from just using a blurry edged look for their dreams like Hitchcock. Although that
effect is still being used, an extended and effective example of which can be seen in Minority Report (2002), it
appears to be far from being the most popular choice today.
Apart from classical blur effects, there are other ways to create a visual vagueness applicable for dreamy imagery. In
Dark City (1998) the blur effect used for the visions the characters receive has evolved into a more dynamic one:
Although it also primarily affects the edges of the picture it’s a radial blur effect (meaning that it consist of blurry
lines recognizably pointing towards/away-from the center of the picture) and the hectic animation, which is suitable
for films with a tense atmosphere like Dark City.
Distortion of images also adds a dreamlike quality by making the surrounding objects appear less stable than they
should’ve been if they were real. Distortion is intensely put into use for the dream sequences in City of Lost
Children (1995). It results in the objects appearing like they’re being slowly but continuously deformed in smooth,
wave-like patterns. It makes the spatial orientation difficult, especially when the camera is moving too, and has a
dizzying effect on the viewer.
A more extreme version of distortion can be seen in the dream sequences of the animated feature Paprika (2006),
where the objects themselves are clearly being deformed and not just the way they look. This directly affects the
characters interaction with the objects.
The final transition phase in Stay (2005), with its stylish combination of blur and minor distortion as earlier
mentioned, can also be considered a much more advanced version of the old-fashioned typical blur Hitchcock was
talking about. And the morphs and transitions within the dream make it significantly more fluid and relatively vague
for the viewers too (See section 2.3.1. Transitions).
Another common method for creating what are considered dreamlike visuals is through combining multiple layers
of video in various ways.
An installation project by Lynne Sanderson called Lucid Touch, where a dream is simulated after the participant
touches a “bioreactive sculpture” 22, relies primarily on this technique: On top of a relatively stable base layer, there
21
Audio Interview with Peter Bogdanovich, 1963. Due to production costs Hitchcock couldn’t shoot the sequence
under direct sunshine to make it as “terribly sharp” as he wanted though; he was forced to shoot it in the studio.
22
“… the participant touches the interface. This allows the non-intrusive detection of real-time biological data from
the participant. This is done through skin conductance response (SCR), heart rate (ECG) and body temperature.
The real-time physiological information is presented to the participant in the form of a dream. The dream is
simulated using images, animation, digital video and sound. The simulated dream is being influenced and controlled
by the participant. The participant's psychophysiological state changes the mood of the dream. Their emotional /
are multiple layers of flashing and phasing videos. Only relatively small parts of the layers above the base layer are
visible at any given time (the rest of the layers are transparent), but with ca. 4-5 layers this can mean that the entire
screen is filled with dynamic visuals all the time. The difference of speed between the transparency shifts of the
layers results in a rapidly changing and capturing flow of images due to all the interaction between multiple layers.
Figure 5: On the left: Flatliners (1990) – A collage of female figures with 4 recognizable layers. On the right: Stay
(2005) - A more complex composited combination of various layers and effects.
Although extensive usage of layers and quick edits can be seen in the depiction of the dream/hallucination
sequences in Altered States (1980), in movies the layer combinations are usually used more conservatively. In
Flatliners a black and white dreamlike sequence starts off simply as smooth transitions between two layers; one
layer is laid over the other with increasing opacity, and the layer below disappears under the second layer. But as the
number of transitioning layers increase all layers combined constitute a flowing collage of videos. In the case of
Flatliners none of the layers are masked or cropped. They all cover the entire screen, but they were shot in front of a
black background and what is actually visible on screen is close-up shots of women. The relative simplicity of
images, supported by a careful composition and timing, allows many layers to be distinguished from each other
without much difficulty. (Fig.5)
As the layers used get visually more complex it becomes harder to keep track of what’s happening in each of them
individually, as can be briefly seen in The Diving Bell and The Butterfly (2007). A more complicated form of using
layers can again be found in Blueberry (2004) and Stay, where layers are carefully edited (cropped, processed,
animated etc.) to make them complement each other when combined. (Fig.5) By increasing the incomprehensibility
and fluidity of what’s visible on screen such effects in a way imitate the uncapturable essence of real dreams.
2.3.3. Time and Motion
The slow-motion effect is a common feature of dreams in films. Numerous movies make use of slow-motion to
emphasize the unreal quality. Luis Buñuel’s Los Olvidados (1950) has a two and a half minutes long slow-motion
dream sequence shot in a small room. Twelve Monkeys (1995) relies heavily on the slow-motion effect to distinguish
a certain event that the protagonist repeatedly dreams about. The Cell (2000) treats the flow of time more playfully
and the speed of time sometimes seems to change from shot to shot, which in one particular instance gives the
impression that the time flows slower for a dog in one room in comparison to where the observing character is
standing.
electrical energy controls video effects and sound.” (Source: http://sustenance.va.com.au/LucidTouch/statem.htm

[Accessed on September 2009])
In imaginary realms the speed of time can also seem to increase of course. In The Gift (2001) a man who’s playing
fiddle appears in the protagonist’s dreamlike vision. Suddenly he starts playing at impossible speeds and sounding
quite disturbing. Time-lapse clouds and videos with similar effect are also considered relatively suitable for a
dreamy look due to their unreal appearance, an example of which again be found in Flatliners.
In City of Lost Children at the very end of the last dream in the film, the speed of the dream increases exponentially
until it becomes unbearable for the dreamer. But what is shown with increasing speed is two brief shots,
continuously repeated. Seeing the same thing over and over with ever increasing speed exhausts the dreamer and the
viewers do not have much difficulty empathizing with him since they basically share the same experience when
watching the dream sequence.
Such glitches of time can also be found in Stay and Slipstream (2007), with much more confusing results. At times
these films seem to jump back and forth in time without any clear clue as to why or what is exactly happening. This
is unlike what people are used to experience in the real world, and such playful treatments make the scenes more
surrealistic.
2.3.4. Fog and Clouds
Smokes, clouds or layers of mist are also often included to create a more paradisiacal look or to add a sense of
mystery to the dream by reducing what’s visible in the distance.
In Brazil (1985) the series of dreams starts with the dreamer flying through beautiful clouds and sunshine. It’s
almost like a caricature of a paradise. In Blade Runner (1982) there is a dream sequence where a unicorn runs
through a misty forest in slow-motion.23 This magical image is in immense contrast to the fascinatingly dark and
spookily realistic atmosphere of the rest of the film.
While in those examples the clouds and fog are used to add depth to a present pleasant image the nightmare
sequences in the Nightmare on Elm Street series also often feature a foggy atmosphere. In that case the intense vapor
in the air seems to empower the villain in the nightmares by reducing the sight range of his victims and creating an
overall intimidating sense of unpredictable danger.
The cliché of smoke-like effects in dream sequences, along with a few other clichés, is made fun of in Living in
Oblivion (1995). It’s a comedy about filmmaking and in it a film crew is having a hard time trying to shoot a dream
sequence. First the smoke machine can puff out only a pathetically little amount of smoke, then it’s too much, and
finally the machine explodes and they decide to shoot without any smoke. This parody indicates that the foggy
atmosphere is featured in dream sequences so frequently that it might no longer be considered interesting, or it may
even be perceived as boring or annoying by some.
In general, because the filmmakers often try to create an unusual atmosphere their dream sequences in various ways,
smoke-like atmospheric effects are relatively popular tools for emphasizing a certain mystery or supernaturalism.
23
The dream sequence cannot be found in the first version released in 1982. It’s in the 1992 director’s cut version
and the other versions after that.
2.3.5. Color and Look
A change in color can be the most obvious factor that visually distinguishes a film’s reality from its imaginary parts.
Over the years there have been many more examples for this type of distinction but one of the earliest and most
famous ones is in The Wizard of Oz (1939). While the Land of Oz in the protagonist Dorothy’s dream is displayed in
bright colors, the film’s reality is shown in sepia tones, making the dream visually richer than the rest and
dramatizing the difference.
In Vertigo (1958), the dream of the protagonist is accompanied by constant changes in color, while no such sudden
changes occur outside the dream. During the dream the normal colors used in film are interrupted by complete
colorization of the frames in a consistent rhythm. The overlaying color varies between blue, purple, green and red.
The rhythm of changing color patterns starts out relatively slow (intervals longer than a second between normal and
colorized frames) and it fastens until the end of the dream (multiple changes within a second). This simple
technique, while distinguishing the dream from the rest of the film, also helps build tension with the increasing
visual pace. The effect is similar to those of fastening heartbeat sounds in a thriller. But it is almost too simple, too
obvious and it can distract or look cheap to a keen observer. This changes when towards the end of the dream
sequence while the rhythm is quite fast, there appear two different color patterns; one for the foreground object (a
floating head) and the other for background with tunnel-effect. This combination results in creating a more dynamic
effect and is likely to overwhelm even a keen eye with the fast-paced visual changes.
In Living in Oblivion -a film about filmmaking- although as earlier mentioned the dreams are revealed to be dreams
only after the dreamer wakes up, general color shifts are used in an interesting way: The film starts in black and
white and continues that way as the dream of a film director, except for the parts where things are shown from the
camera’s point of view within the dream. In those moments it temporarily switches to color but then continues in
black & white. After the director of the film -within the film- wakes up in his bed the film switches to color and it’s
revealed that all that has happened on the set was just a dream. Then while it continues in color, although it is not
revealed to the audience, a second dream starts without any change in color. But the camera’s point of view within
the dream is now shown in black & white. So the relationship between color and the filmed vs. apparent reality in
the two dreams are the opposite of each other. The film returns to the reality after the second dreamer wakes up.
This time no change in color occurs and the film continues in color. The camera’s view in the first dream, the
second dream’s reality and the reality of the film are in color while the first dream’s reality and the camera’s view in
the second dream were black & white. This tricky play with colors makes the film more intriguing. But an effect like
this wouldn’t be appropriate for too many films. So this is a very film-specific visual strategy for depiction of
dreams.
Apart from such obvious changes in color, often more subtle changes in the visual appearance of hue, saturation,
brightness and contrast of the images create a distinction between the dreams and the reality of films. How the
difference is emphasized depends very much on artistic preferences, rather than a strict traditional logic.
In Terry Gilliam’s Twelve Monkeys (1995) there is a very clear example of how a filmmaker chose to make a dream
appear more dreamlike, because two different versions can be directly compared; the flashback-dream version of an
event with the real one. Both versions are shot almost identically. The dream differs from the real event mainly in
that the dream is much brighter in comparison. It has a striking and powerful look, flooded with white. The reality
appears somewhat dull in comparison, and of course more normal and real. (Fig. 6)
Figure 6: On the left side is the real version of a key event in Twelve Monkeys (1995). On the right side how the
dreamer remembers the same event in his dreams.
In contrast the dream sequences in In Dreams (1999) are in general very desaturated, except for the color red which
really comes out in the absence of all the other colors. The film Dark City (1998) also makes use of similar effects,
but in the opposite direction: the dreamy visions in Dark City are more saturated and brighter than the rest of the
film. Sleepy Hollow (1999) has both kinds: Two dreams that are for the most part much more colorful and vivid than
the general look of the film and another dream where all colors except red tones are almost completely desaturated.
While the colorful parts correspond to certain places and people the dreamer feels more positively about, the people
and places that invoke bad feelings for the dreamer are represented with the desaturated look.
If there are multiple dream sequences within a film, then the dreams may show dramatically different visual
characteristics even within the same film if the story demands it. Considering that dreams usually reflect the inner
world of characters it makes sense for dreams in a film to differ in visual style if they belong to different characters
(Flatliners, Requiem for a Dream [2000]). With a similar logic, a film where a character goes through a dramatic
transformation may also reflect that through a dramatic change in visual style of the representations of the
characters’ dreams.
Although the alternative realm presented in What Dreams May Come (1998) is not exactly a regular dream, it is
fueled by a characters’ imagination and it features a unique treatment of color in films. As earlier mentioned 24 the
protagonist of the film finds himself in a paradise specific to his own personality and imagination, which results in
his paradise being almost exactly like an extended 3D version of his wife’s paintings. What this means is that
everything in the environment is made of paint. The colors are smudged as he touches them with his hands or as he
walks on the plants/flowers made of paint. The texture of all surfaces resembles the look of an impressionistic oil
painting, as if they’re all created by three dimensional brush strokes, with all the roughness and “imperfection”
intact. It is a painting that came to life in a sense, and the outcome on screen is truly fascinating. (Fig.7) But even
though it looks very surreal and dreamlike it’s also a film-specific look. Trying to replicate it in an irrelevant context
wouldn’t be likely to bring equal success. Nevertheless it certainly is inspiring and gives a good idea about what
filmmakers can achieve if they aim for going beyond the typical realistic look in their creations.
24
In section 2.1.3. Supernatural Dreaming
Figure 7: What Dreams May Come (1998). After his death Chris (Robin Williams) finds himself in the 'painted
world’. While excitedly walking around he sinks into a pool of paint.
What can be observed on the whole is that there are again no rules, but there are certain tendencies forming the
artistic decisions. The colors are often closely associated with the dreamers’ emotional states. But the color and look
may also have distinct characteristics independent from emotions, and more related to the filmmakers’ desire to give
the filmic dreams a clearly different feel from the filmic reality, or also from other filmic dreams.
2.3.6. Contextual Design
The visual appearance of some dream sequences can also be interesting primarily because of the apparent physical
content of the dream, independent from specific visual effects which modify the look relatively little. Unusual
architecture, strange costumes, surreal creatures or objects, bizarre happenings and things like that can easily result
in interesting visuals on their own. Such things are related to the general contextual design of the dream sequence.
The freedom that the dream logic provides to the artists unleashes a certain kind of creativity which would not be
congruous with an art that strives to remain realistic. In that regard many filmic dream sequences inevitably have
things in common with surreal art or fantasy genre.
The aspect of contextual design is actually where the animated dreams especially stand out in comparison to their
live-action counterparts, due to the artistic freedom of the animation. But the selected examples of certain animated
films are examined separately in a later chapter, and this section’s focus is primarily on live-action films.
Some of what this contextual design aspect encompasses has already been covered in previous chapters indirectly
and all the rest of it would not be possible to cover within the confinement of this research, since the range of such
content is too wide. But to make the distinction from other types of visual effects clearer a few significant examples
will be mentioned.
The dream sequences in The Cell are basically complex combinations of foreign environments, unusual costumes,
extreme architecture, strange people, weird decorations and things that can be best described as bizarre. Perhaps the
most interesting moment in that respect is where a horse is sliced and dissected into pieces by a series of large, sharp
glasses without any clear reason. The horse’s heart still attempts to keep beating even after it’s cut in half. (Fig. 8)
It’s simply a striking picture. There is no reason for such things to happen in real life even if they were technically
possible, and the dynamics in modern life (e.g. laws, reason etc.) actually prevent such things from happening.
Therefore it’s something relatively new to the human eyes and attracts attention.
Figure 8: Left: The slices of the horse are pulled away from each other in The Cell (2000). Right: A jellyfish swarm
gently swimming in the air above a desert wasteland in Hulk (2003).
Similar objects and events of interest can be seen in many other films too. Dreamscape (1984), Brazil (1985),
Jacob’s Ladder (1990) and Naked Lunch (1991) feature strange creatures. In the Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)
series Freddy Krueger does something supernaturally disgusting to freak out the dreamers every once in a while, like
cutting himself with his claws to show the maggots coming out of his body and laughing, as in the first movie. Such
extreme images can also be considered visually intriguing. Not much less disgustingly, in Aliens (1986) and in The
Fly (1986) two women seem to have rather undesirable creatures (for regular humans) coming out of their bodies.
Exposure to such images can trigger strong emotional reactions from a typical viewer.
But of course such scenes don’t always have to be so intensely dramatic for an immense visual stimulation. In
Science of Sleep the dreamer’s hands become huge for a while and a huge typing machine types itself with its hairy
arms. Both of those are unusual sights. Big Lebowski (1998) features a bowling shoe stand that reaches the moon,
and a bowling lane in space that is arrived through a black and white checkered, seemingly-endless staircase. In
Hulk (2003) there is a strange yet peaceful moment in a dream where a swarm of jellyfish floats over a desert
wasteland. (Fig.8) In Altered States (1980) there are incongruent chains of images: a crucified figure with a seven-
eyed goat head flying in the sky, various lights, sparks, particles swirling around, organic-looking detail shots,
people turning into sand etc. All that combined creates a visually intense ride.
Living in Oblivion also touches the cliché of using dwarves to make the dreams appear weirder. The dwarf, Tito,
who is hired to act weirdly in the dream sequence (walking in circles with an apple in the hand and finishing with a
crazy laughter) actually gets mad while shooting the scene and leaves the set after this memorable dialog with the
film’s director Nick:
Tito: Why does my character have to be a dwarf?

Nick: He doesn't have to be.
Tito: Then why is he? Is that the only way you can make this a dream, to put a dwarf in it?
Nick: No, Tito, I...
Tito: Have you ever had a dream with a dwarf in it? Do you know anyone who's had a dream with a dwarf
in it? No! I don't even have dreams with dwarves in them. The only place I've seen dwarves in dreams is in
stupid movies like this! "Oh make it weird, put a dwarf in it!”. Everyone will go "Woah, this must be a
fucking dream, there's a fucking dwarf in it!”. Well I'm sick of it! You can take this dream sequence and
stick it up your ass!
The work of the filmmaker David Lynch was probably one of the strongest influences for making dwarves such a
popular choice for creating a bizarre atmosphere in dreams. He has often used dwarves in his projects, which mostly
have a surreal, strange quality with or without dwarves in them. Which parts of his films are dreams and which are
just parts of bizarre alternative realities is often not clear. However the dream sequences from Lynch’s popular TV
series Twin Peaks (1990) is likely to be the main cause of the above quoted dialog. But long before Lynch, there was
the “Munchkinland” in Victor Fleming’s The Wizard of Oz (1939), a magical place where “the little people” called
Munchkins live. The Munchkins were played by dwarves in the film version of Dorothy’s imaginary adventure.
All in all dream sequences regularly feature figures, objects and events which stand out with their eccentricity,
improbability or implausibility, if observed objectively. Yet during the film these may invoke a sense of wonder,
surprise or horror.
Apart from such sequences which are primarily intended to just look unusual, symbolic representations also play a
big role in filmic dreams, due to the associative nature of dream logic, and often they too result in interesting
visuals. Symbols in different forms are usually scattered around in many filmic dreams. But in some films this
becomes more obvious:
Alfred Hitchcock’s Spellbound (1945) is a detective story in which the dream of a character plays a key role.
Because he remembers very little of his past consciously, almost every element of the dream of is a symbol for a
critical piece of the puzzle. A revolver is represented as a deformed wheel, a cliff as a rooftop, the murderer as a
mysterious masked man and the name of a club (“21 Club”) is communicated through playing cards. The symbolic
depiction (a masked man with a deformed wheel in his hand standing on a roof) in combination with the already
surreal environment (Fig.1) can be considered visually interesting.
A similar example can be seen in Brazil, where the real-life adventures of the protagonist are retold in his dreams in
a symbolic way with the protagonist represented as the angelic hero in knight armor, the difficulties he faces as huge
blocks of stone, strange creatures or a giant samurai.
In Wild Strawberries (1957) the protagonist’s fear of death is represented in a dream where neither the clock on the
street nor his watch have hands, they’re just blank. Then he’s confronted first with an obscure stranger who just falls
down and disappears with only leaving blood behind, and after that another version of the protagonist shows up
from within a coffin and tries to pull the dreamer toward the coffin. It’s overall a bizarre dream and contains
interesting visual elements.
As earlier mentioned 25 the dream sequence in The Fall also ends with an interesting symbolic representation of a
little girl’s treatment by doctors. For example the way they take her head’s X-ray is depicted in the dream is quite
surreal: As a wrecking ball swings back and forth it somehow passes through the girl’s head who is standing in the
middle of the swing axis. In that moment where the wrecking ball and her head intersect the figures representing the
doctors see the X-ray of her skull in a crystal ball from another location in real-time. In a way it is what a magical,
medieval version of an X-ray machine would look like.
25
In section 2.3.1. Transitions.
The Role of Animation | 37
3. The Role of Animation

In this chapter the meaning of animation in relation to the dreams in films is examined. Starting with its place in
live-action dreams, animation’s advantages and disadvantages is briefly discussed. Following that some examples
for animation use in films are presented to establish the distinguishing qualities of 2D and 3D animation methods.
3.1. Animation and Live Action Dreams
At present it is quite common to see in many movies some form of animation being used for certain challenging
tasks. Specifically creating sceneries which are hard –if not impossible-to create with real world decors and special
effects can be much easier to accomplish with help from traditional 2D animation, computer animation or other
kinds of animation.
Drawings and other mediums for creating 2D animation, be it digital or analog, give the artists theoretically infinite
freedom. Similarly, while to record something with a real camera only enables filmmakers to capture real light
reflected from real matter (real actors, real objects etc.), virtual cameras in 3D software can capture things that can
only exist in virtual realities, as well as realistic representations of real-world objects. Various stop-motion
animation techniques also allow filmmakers to be more flexible with their choices of storytelling.
So in their aspirations to go beyond reality, filmmakers often find themselves preferring to go away from using real
objects to create the images they want, and they take advantage of certain freedoms offered by various animation
methods. This inclination becomes even stronger when it comes to making various forms of dreams and surreal
fantasies come true. Just as cameras allowed artists to selectively “capture” and “edit” reality to create new,
fictitious realities they conceived, animation offers new opportunities for taking it further and making even more
extraordinary imaginary realities feel believable:
The animation technique based on rotoscoping used in two of Richard Linklater’s films Waking life (2001) and A
Scanner Darkly (2006) is an illuminative example in that regard. Basically the scenes are first filmed with real
actors and the animation is based on that footage, using a technique called interpolated rotoscope. That way the
animators can mostly just focus on copying the movements of the actors for the motion, and then they can build the
look and exact content they desire on top of that basis. As earlier mentioned, Waking Life is a film that is depicted
more or less like one long lucid dream experience, where the protagonist first doesn’t realize that he is in a dream
and then fails to get out of it even after he does realize what’s going on. In an interview Linklater says the following
on the animation technique’s relevance to the dream state depicted in this film:
“I think to make a realistic film about an unreality the film had to be a realistic unreality. You know, the
animation is that. It's realistic because it's real voices, real gestures, real people and yet it's unreal because
it's ultimately an animation of that. And yet it's real world based, so it's the perfect kind of place to watch
this movie from. And that's the perfect look for this particular movie." 26
26
Interview with Richard Linklater by Spence D. (2001) http://uk.movies.ign.com/articles/307/307481p1.html
(Accessed on September 2009)
In a way what he says is that since animation can’t be completely realistic it has an integral surreal quality, which
arguably automatically makes animation dreamlike. The amount of animated surreal elements in Waking Life, mixed
into the film’s rotoscoped visuals, is relatively low. But there are still moments where the film goes from looking
very realistic to looking very surreal. Due to the rotoscoping both the hand-animated parts and the parts copied from
live-action footage can have basically the same visual style, which results in a smooth integration of the surreal
animated parts into the realistic parts. This is also similar for the hallucination sequences in Linklater’s A Scanner
Darkly.
Apart from that, traditional 2D animation can be seen on its own in the mostly-live-action nightmare sequence of
Hitchcock’s Vertigo (1958) used for depicting a surreally dissolving bunch of flowers right at the beginning of the
nightmare.
A little stop-motion animation is used briefly in the dream sequence in The Fall (2006), as earlier mentioned, and
the same technique is used a lot in the imaginary sequences of The Science of Sleep (2006) where the protagonist at
one point even causes a mini apocalypse to intimidate his coworkers in his dream and then rebuilds the civilization
he destroyed; something that the director tells in a relatively simple visual language through stop-motion animation.
Both 2D and 3D computer graphics are integrated into the live-action-based dream sequences of films like The Cell
(2000), Blueberry (2004), Hulk (2003) and Watchmen (2009) in various ways, which enable the sequences to
acquire higher levels of surrealism.27
In addition to the apparent advantages of animation mentioned in the examples above, certain animation methods, if
truly detached from live-action, can give the artists a more special kind of freedom with benefits that are very
relevant to the art of depicting all kinds of dreams.
3.2. Advantages of Animation
If hand-drawn animation is examined closely, it becomes obvious that the content and the quality of animation is
only dependent on the skills of the artists and how much those skills can be put into good use. In live-action movies
the filmmakers are mostly constrained on the real-world objects they have access to: They have to find the right
actors, locations, decors, costumes etc. and then there are also things over which a filmmaker has no control, such as
the physical laws. They have to work with what they got. If the things and conditions they’re looking for don’t yet
exist they have to find ways to fake them or they settle for less than the ideal results. There are many artistic
limitations involved, which inevitably cast a lot of uncertainty on to the development of an original film idea, and
possibly drive the final artwork away from how it was actually conceived to be.
In hand-drawn animation on the other hand, the limitations are of a different kind. Whether the desired actor is a fat,
old man or a tiny baby is of no concern to a character designer. As long as there’s something specific in mind, then
it can be translated onto paper, thus into the reality of the animation. The same applies to all the other conditions too
of course, including all the dynamics of the imaginary universe: An alternative reality where gravity or light behaves
27
Unlike The Cell and Blueberry, the films Hulk and Watchmen also feature lots of 2D/3D effects outside the dream
sequences, but what’s depicted with those techniques significantly differ between the filmic reality and the filmic
dreams.
differently from our reality would not be necessarily more difficult to depict in animation than a realistic animation,
unless the difference is so extreme that it affects the form of objects. If a realistic figure has to take part in an
extraordinary or supernatural action the technical complexity of such scenes is much less than it would be in live-
action.
It’s also similar in 3D computer animation. It has a lot in common with 2D with regard to surreal depictions, but
there are also many dissimilarities. Basically the computer screen is also like a blank sheet of paper where any
design can be brought into life. Despite the technical differences the artistic freedom is theoretically also infinite in
3D since the artist has control over each pixel on the screen. But 3D CGI wasn’t intended to be used in a similar
fashion as 2D animation. 3D’s distinguishing advantage over 2D has been the opportunity to work with
continuously existent digital models, independent from the number of frames pro second. Once a model is finished
it’s possible to travel around it with a virtual camera. In other words 3D is more suitable for creating virtual realities
which share certain fundamental similarities with our own reality, such as consistency of existence, forms and
spatial depth. The significant advantage is to have full control over the content of that alternative reality.
All this indicates that animation is a very suitable medium when it comes to creating surreal and supernatural
imageries that are characteristic of dreams. But this freedom comes with a cost of course.
3.3. Disadvantages of Animation
Having so much control over an artistic creation also necessitates that somebody has to actively take part in the
creation process. This means that even a rather simple design requires some effort to become visible. It has to be
drawn or modeled, all the details may require a lot of attention to be completed and there are different tasks involved
in this process.
To prepare a detailed 3D character with all the intricate geometric details, the texture maps and a complex rig for
the movements usually requires a serious teamwork for a significant period of time in big productions. In
comparison to that a real human actor is already ready for “rendering” by a video camera, except for the costumes,
make-up and such relatively undramatic possible adjustments.
Then there is also the challenging task of animating the character. Even if motion-capturing is used instead of
animating by hand, it’s at the present usually still a complicated process with a lot of limitations and complications.
To hand-animate perfectly realistic human figures for 24 frames per seconds is inconceivable, which is the average
number of frames in a second in standard live-action or 3D film projects. That’s firstly because the distinct look of a
drawing or a painting is even harder to conceal in comparison to a detailed 3D model. Just a single photorealistic
drawing/painting would require a lot of time and effort even for the most skilled of artists. Secondly, in 3D and in
live-action the filmed objects have a consistent presence independent from the camera’s perspective. On the other
hand in hand-drawn animation every slight change in the imaginary camera’s perspective would require a different
drawing if it’s meant to simulate a realistic change in perspective.
Unlike in 3D animation there are no aspirations among 2D animators to reach perfect photorealism in the future. But
either way, it is clear that 2D/3D animation is not the wisest choice just for designing regular human figures at
present. In movies, although there is currently a transformation going on, at the present realistic 3D humans are still
mostly only then used when there are certain scenes which are impossible or hard to realize with real actors, like the
surreal fighting sequences in The Matrix Reloaded (2003) where multiple versions of a single character are supposed
to appear in the same scene doing extremely acrobatic moves.
The difficulties do not instantly disappear when the designed characters are not human or not realistic at all either.
Even the strangest and most supernatural characters require a lot of attention to come to life. Realism is not the
issue. What matters is the amount of overall detail and complexity. Especially in hand drawn animation many small
details like wrinkles and individual hair strands are inevitably sacrificed to keep the figure simple enough for
affordable animation. In 3D animation there is progress towards creating more realistic figures, but so far perfect
realism with pure CGI hasn’t been achieved. Such a task requires too much time, effort (technology and manpower),
and therefore a huge budget.28
In addition to such technical difficulties there is also a matter of artistic taste. In animation, especially if hand-
drawn, there isn’t much room for improvisation or making big spontaneous changes. Unless every detail is planned
beforehand and unless that plan is strictly followed things can easily go wrong. A second chance to correct a mistake
might have a huge cost. If the initial idea and the plan had been realistic enough, meaning achievable, it’s possible
for the artist to bring the original idea into life exactly as it was imagined. But if a certain shot doesn’t seem to work
as good as intended, then there might not be another take to replace it during editing. It might have to be partially or
completely redone and this may mean a lot of work. In comparison to live-action, in animation it will also be harder
to implement potential useful ideas into the movie, which occur to the filmmaker after the production starts, because
the production team will already have worked according to the original plan. In other words, having so much control
over the initial direction of the production also has some significant disadvantages.
With all that being said the potential of animation is still very valuable. And in the next chapter the consequences of
the freedom provided by it will be explored further in relation to the visual representations of dreams.
3.4. Selected Animation Examples and Further Discussion
When it comes to dreams, fantasies and other forms of surreal or abstract themes, the advantages animation offer
makes it a very interesting tool. Apart from time, budget and manpower the only thing that can limit what can be
done with animation is basically a lack of imagination.
The “magic” of animation has always lied in the fact that it makes it possible to tell extremely unrealistic stories;
stories that would have been otherwise impossible to tell exactly in that way just with video cameras, due to the
surreal nature of the content. Be it talking/dancing animals, robots or other creatures, or even completely abstract
shapes animation seemingly can give life to all forms of creations. The aspect of motion is what makes animation
superior to paintings or individual drawings when it comes to storytelling. The continuity of detail between to
moments in time intensifies the visual experience and makes the unreal more convincing.
An overview of a few striking examples of animation are given below in order to emphasize the advantages the
medium brings when it comes to dream representations:
28
James Cameron’s upcoming project Avatar is expected to raise the stakes. But it’s important to note that it will be
one of the most expensive movies ever. Its budget exceeds $200 million.
(Source: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1886541.html [Accessed on September 2009])
Disney’s Fantasia (1940) starts with an announcement saying that what is shown will be “the designs and pictures
and stories that music inspired in the minds and imaginations of a group of artists”. So although not directly
presented as a dream, a certain dream factor is still acknowledged from the beginning. And the first sequence aims
to depict what would pass through a person’s mind if sitting in a concert hall: various abstract visuals based on what
the music suggests to the imagination.
Although the inspiration for the sequences in Fantasia 2000 (1999) is not so explicitly stated it’s basically the same
with the first Fantasia. After the first abstract sequence both films go on to present surreal stories accompanying
classical music pieces. Fantasia 2000, being made 60 years later than Fantasia, has a crisper look. But in the end
both are wonderful displays of the flexibility and potential of animation; from abstract lights and shapes to dancing
hippos, flying whales, fairies and demonic creatures they show that there is virtually nothing that can’t be done with
animation.
Disney’s animated feature Dumbo (1941) came a year after the first Fantasia and it explicitly features a long
hallucination/dream sequence which starts with a floating bubble turning into a loud parade full with pink elephants.
After an increasingly surreal and intense visual ride through all the images of elephants they morph into pink
morning clouds and the dreamer Dumbo is shown sleeping on a tree. It is a very unique and memorable sequence.
Fantasia 2000 is also supported by 3D computer graphics which reduce the effort needed to animate certain scenes.
Although not as wildly fantastic as Fantasia 2000 the Japanese animated feature Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence
(2004) also makes effective use of both traditional 2D and 3D graphics, where two people’s minds are hacked and
without being aware of it they’re mentally trapped in a strange, repeated virtual event. A visually more striking
virtual reality experience with an effective combination of 2D and 3D techniques can be seen in one of the short
films of The Animatrix (2003); the one titled Matriculated, where a robot is exposed to the wonderfully imaginative
side of humans within the colorful virtual reality.
Various forms of dream sequences can also be seen in 3D animation projects.
Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001) features several separate dream sequences where the dreamer receives
visions from the ghosts of aliens from another planet. The dreams inform her about the history of the species and
how their home planet was destroyed. Contextually these dreams aren’t exactly any more surreal than the rest of the
film, their content is actually somewhat less sophisticated since the filmic reality contains many glowing,
transparent, giant creatures attacking spaceships and things like that. But the sequences’ mood and certain visual
qualities, such as fluent transitions and soft blur effects, distinguish them from the filmic reality. All the dreams
actually seem to take place in the alien planet while the real story transpires on earth. The visuals in this film are
overall impressively pretty, and the dream sequences are no exception to that. The technical strengths of 3D
computer graphics for creating dreamlike visuals are clearly demonstrated throughout the dream sequences in this
film, even if its content isn’t exceptionally surreal.
Apart from that, in Pixar’s Toy Story 2 (1999) the cowboy doll Woody has a somewhat surreal nightmare where he’s
thrown away and Pixar’s Cars (2006) features alongside an absurd nightmare also a few interesting daydreams. In
Ratatouille (2007) there are no regular dreams but there is the hallucination of the imaginary chef Gusteau
accompanying the protagonist rat Remy throughout the whole film. Gusteau is either shown floating around with a
tiny transparent body or he seems to come to life through his pictures on billboards, papers etc. In Ratatouille there
are also the 2D visual representations of the mental impact of various tastes in the film, much like the abstract visual
expressions of sounds in Fantasia.
Figure 9: Two frames from the dream sequence in Kung Fu Panda (2008). The one on the right shows the Panda
just before falling down and waking up from his dream.
Such combinations of multiple techniques are not uncommon among animated 3D films.
Kung Fu Panda (2008) from DreamWorks starts with a 2D dream sequence. It has a completely different style from
the rest of the 3D feature, which is the primary factor that makes the sequence relatively more dreamlike. The
content, although much more exaggerated in certain aspects, is otherwise not significantly more surreal than the rest
of the film. (Fig.9)
Horton Hears a Who! (2008) from Blue Sky Studios also depicts the imaginary parts of the film in 2D: One
sequence in Japanese anime style and two very short sequences in a simple mostly black and white drawing style.
With such examples the relativity of “dreamlikeness” also becomes clearer. The non-dream parts of these 3D
animated features are already more surreal than many dream sequences in live-action films and some films already
make use of 2D/3D animation for adding a dreamlike quality to their dream sequences, most notably the
mesmerizing CG dominated hallucination sequences in Blueberry (2004) are partially devoid of any live-action
footage, and are created primarily by using 3D computer graphics.
But despite that clear dreamlike potential of 3D animation, apparently the 3D animated features still resort to 2D
animation for their own dream sequences. The primary reason for such a decision is arguably not that 3D can’t be as
dreamlike as 2D, but that the filmmakers wanted to create a visual distinction between the two different realms.
Nevertheless unlike with the relatively intransigent 3D models, the independence of each frame from the others in
hand-drawn animation does indeed bring some advantages when creating dreamlike visuals; i.e. enables animators
to play more freely with shapes and perspectives, and in so doing reduce the realistic stability of objects.
One example for demonstrating that flexibility of hand-drawn animation is the animated short film Destino (2003)29
where Disney collaborated with Salvador Dali. 30 Although it’s only partially presented as a dream its surrealism is
consistent throughout the film, therefore it’s an appropriate example for examining the relevance of animation to
dreams. And in the film some structures and objects which were not meant for extensive animation are done in 3D,
while more animate objects and figures are done in 2D, which for example makes the animation of a tiny ant
morphing into a man with bicycle easier. In many projects combining the two techniques a similar strategy is used.
29
The project was canceled for financial reasons in 1946 but it was revamped and completed in 2003. (Source:
http://www.collectorseditions.com/disney/vitae.php?aID=520Destino [Accessed on September 2009])
30
Salvador Dali’s work is often seen as having a dream-like quality. One of his paintings has even the title Dream
Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate, A Second Before Awakening.
One of the significant examples would be the animated short 1001 Nights (1998) where CG is used for relatively
rigid structures while the rest of the fluid animation is hand-drawn and painted.
Another relevant example is The Triplets of Belleville (2003). It is essentially a traditionally animated, hand-drawn
feature film supported minimally by 3D CGI and even less by live-action footage. It features multiple, black and
white dream sequences of a dog, all of which also combine 2D and 3D. The locomotive in the dream and the dog’s
food bowl are in 3D while the dog and other organic figures are animated in traditional 2D. One of the dream
sequences also contains some processed live-action footage for a shot where the locomotive with the dog on top is
moving extremely fast on a road. This is possibly just because the filmmakers thought that a shot like that would be
unnecessarily time-consuming to animate and live-action footage is just fine for that particular purpose.
The final example is Satoshi Kon’s animated feature Paprika (2006), where a team of researchers can dive into
other people’s dreams by using a technological device. At the present, Paprika is arguably the best film for
appreciating the extreme potential of animation when it comes to visual representations of dreams. Although the
film often makes use of 3D graphics it’s essentially hand-animated, which enables the film to be exceptionally
imaginative and rich.
Paprika is in a way a realistic science fiction. The world and the humans are designed and animated rather
realistically, unlike the caricaturized reality of The Triplets of Belleville. But it is also an extremely surreal piece of
art because the dream aspect eventually dominates the film and takes over the filmic reality. The film never gets
significantly abstract. It always sticks to a certain realism in the way all the objects are depicted but the content of
what’s presented as existent, the surrealism, whether in dreams or in the filmic reality invaded by the dreams,
doesn’t know any boundaries.
The film starts with an impressive animation where a circus clown forces himself out of a tiny toy car. That act in
first shot alone would be impossible for a real human to perform. Throughout the film things like mustached little
girls, exploding bodies, giant terrorist Japanese dolls, insane or eccentric behavior, jumps from one location to
another, people turning into animals, plants, toys, supernatural creatures of various types, and many other surreal
things like these can be seen.
For example there’s a basis dream in the film, which consists of an exuberant parade of numerous dolls, toys,
creatures and walking household items. All these are accompanied by a song and are in constant rhythmic
movement. This unstoppable mass of colorful surrealism tends to invade whatever mind it comes in contact with and
eventually it leaks into the reality too. As more and more people’s unconscious expressions join this parade, and as
the parade keeps on marching, the collective dream gets bigger and bigger. (Fig. 10)
Certainly the technical achievement which made a feature film like Paprika possible is extraordinary. But it also
clearly shows where 2D animation is superior to other mediums. It gives the artists such a degree of flexibility that
they can play with the notion of reality without alienating the audience. Contrary to realistic 3D and live-action, a
realistic complexity of the textures and other details play a minor role in 2D. Visually the shapes and the movements
are emphasized much more than anything else.
What the film Paprika does best is to disregard so many of our conceptions about the nature of reality, which gets its
dream sequences closer to the unpredictable, irrational nature of human dreams. Everything can change at any
moment in any way, without the need for any consistent structure behind it all, which may describe the nature of
dreams and what the filmmakers had in mind more accurately. There are many moments in the film which force the
audience to let go of their most common assumptions to be able to relate to the characters’ experiences throughout
all the dreams.
Figure 10: Paprika (2006) – The parade of combined dreams is marching through the real city.
Satoshi Kon, the director of Paprika, states in an interview from 2004 that he is more interested in animation than
live-action because that’s what he is best at. 31 But telling a complex story like Paprika’s with such visual richness
would also be impossible to achieve in any other medium, especially if the project’s budget is taken into
consideration: The budget of Paprika seems to be around $3 million. 32 In comparison the cheapest Pixar film, Toy
Story (1995), cost $30 million. Pixar’s WALL-E (2008) had a budget of $180 million.33 And an average Hollywood
movie costs $100 million.34
So in exchange for certain aspects of realism present in live-action and 3D graphics, like dynamic lighting/shadows,
detailed texturing, reflections etc., what 2D animation can offer is a manifestation of human imagination at a
relatively low cost. 3D animation usually has a higher cost if it’s meant to depict a complete alternative reality. But
it can mimic realistic dynamics more accurately while partially maintaining the imaginative aspects of 2D. And live-
action is basically the cheapest one, but on its own it’s also very limited in comparison to animation forms.
In the end, all techniques have certain advantages and disadvantages of course, and decisions about which
techniques to use should be made on a case by case basis, after carefully considering what is needed in a scene and
what would work best for that particular purpose. Nevertheless the potential advantages sourcing from the freedom
of animation is very clear.
31
Source: http://www.gamestar.com/11_04/pause/pause_disc_satoshikon.shtml (Accessed on September 2009)
32
Source: http://www.michaelbarrier.com/Feedback/feedback_satoshi_kon.htm (Accessed on September 2009)
33
Source: http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/series/Pixar.php (Accessed on September 2009)
34
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/3564377.stm (Accessed on September 2009)
Conclusion 45
4. Conclusion
A basic overview of the visual dream representations in films has been provided. The general nature, the narrative
functions and visual characteristics of dream sequences have been examined and the role of animation in all this has
been illuminated.
This general analysis can help understand the dynamics behind artistic decision making related to the topic of
dreaming in motion pictures. Since the art of filmmaking is still relatively young in comparison to other art forms
like painting or writing, this work also inevitably reflects the cultural and artistic perspective of modern humans on
dreams, even though it didn’t distinguish between examples from early 20 th century and 21st century. The way
modern films handle dreams is certainly very different from the interpretations in ancient writings.35 The artists’
approach to dreams is likely to continue going through dramatic changes in the future too, as indicated by films like
Science of Sleep (2006) with its elegant confusedness. As scientific researchers further our understanding of human
dreams and other activities related to imagination, as the minds’ mysteries dissolve in time, the filmmakers will have
a hard time using the dream sequences as multi-functionally as they do today (See section 2.2. Themes and
Narrative Roles). For example the implausibility of supernatural dreams or dreams without fluent structures are
likely to increase. Dream sequences with significantly more illogical structures are likely to become more common
and significant scientific developments with regard to the visual characteristics of dreams also might occur. In that
regard it could be interesting to look back on this text years from now for observing the cultural progress throughout
time, and how that will be reflected in future art forms.
In addition to that, all the examples that have been mentioned throughout the text constitute a collection of valuable
inspiration sources of course. Should artists desire to integrate some kind of dreamlike sequence into their work in
the future this thesis can aid their decisions. The analysis can help people avoid old, used ideas, learn from them and
it may inspire ideas for new and fresh ways to approach dreams in the future. The information on the visual
treatment of dreams could help increase the visual impact of future dream sequences if studied closely.
For those interested in the topic of dreams’ role in films this thesis can also play the role of a basis for future
research. This work had to be rather superficial in many aspects due to the limitations of time and space. There is
undoubtedly a lot more that can be explored much more in depth, like the narrative complexities of filmic dreams
and the dreams relation to the film theory in general 36, or also a more detailed and technical analysis of visual
characteristics might give valuable new insights about how the dreamlike stream of images may be affecting the
human mind. Although not really mentioned throughout this text, the aural qualities of the dream representations in
films also have an important role for achieving a certain dreamlikeness, and examining the sounds’ exact relation to
the visuals could deepen the understanding of both aspects. This thesis, although it did not pursue such goals, can
provide a basic foundation to start doing so for future researchers with the overview it provides, and the collection of
examples can save future research time.
35
Long before films existed, dreams were a part of human life. The source of dreams was a mystery to ancient
cultures and like many other things they were also believed to have some sort of supernatural origin. In modern age
with the influence of psychological research, dreams are generally accepted to be a natural phenomenon and are
scientifically examined as expressions of the unconscious mind. The current view of dreams inevitably influenced
how films treat the subject. (Source: http://www.ondreaming.com/theories/index.htm [Accessed September 2009])
36
See Films and Dreams: Tarkovsky, Bergman, Sokurov, Kubrick and Wong Kar-wai by Thorsten Botz-Bornstein,
[New York: Lexington, 2007].
Conclusion| 46
Apart from that, the role of animation has been emphasized because of its significance in relation to the depictions
of the imaginary. The difference of the level of creative freedom between live-action and animation is not to be
ignored. It is worth noting that the 2D traditional animation techniques are not advancing as significantly as 3D
animation technologies. The flexibility of 3D animation is likely to continue increasing and its costs decreasing. So
the freedom of 3D animation could eventually surpass the level of freedom offered by traditional 2D animation on
all levels and be affordable at the same time. In that case the imagination of artists can be set even more loose than it
is today, which would create more room for dreams in visual arts. As time passes, as much as some artists may aim
for photorealism, many are likely to stretch the boundaries of human dreams. And developing animation techniques
ease the process of bringing the craziest dreams to life. Whether or not the new creations will be sold as alternative
realities or dreams within those realities, the future of films will have more room for more imaginative, creative, and
therefore dreamlike content. In that respect it is important for artists to understand and effectively use the potential
animation has for depicting the imaginary, and of course the potential of the imaginary itself, which is the reason for
depicting it.
Lastly, a word of caution: It might be wise to beware of this wonderful potential of animation; for if it’s
inconsiderately used for distancing humanity further from reality by attracting them to the fascinating unrealities, as
it seems to be currently happening with increasing video game addictions37, it may cost the human species dearly in
these really troubling times. It should be kept in mind that without reality there won’t be any dreaming either. So
perhaps before enthusiastically heading towards more and more absorbing dreams, securing the reality -the
foundation of dreams- should be made a priority. This thesis didn’t closely examine at what cost all these wonderful
dreams come to be and at what cost people enjoy them, but it’s not difficult to imagine that were the humans to pay
more sincere attention to the reality than they do today, then the true reality could be more “dreamlike”, and the real
humans may be less needy of artificial dreams. Even if the connection of these concerns to this thesis is not
immediately clear, such things are probably worth consideration for all artists and non-artists alike, whether they’re
interested in dreams or reality, or both. Arguably such thoughts should be considered relevant to all arts nowadays.
37
See for some basic information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_addiction
47
Bibliography
Books
Botz-Bornstein, T.: Films and Dreams: Tarkovsky, Bergman, Sokurov, Kubrick and Wong Kar-wai. Lexington
Books, New York u.a. 2007.
Halpern, L.: Dreams on Film: The Cinematic Struggle Between Art and Science. Mcfarland & Co, London u.a. 2003
O'Flaherty, W.D.: Dreams, Illusion, and Other Realities. University of Chicago Press, 1986.
Packer, S.: Dreams in Myth, Medicine, and Movies. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002.
Pomerance, M.: An eye for Hitchcock. Rutgers University Press, 2004.
Truffaut, F., Scott, H. G.: Hitchcock - Revised Edition. Simon & Schuster, New York u.a. 1985.
Other
Sanhchez, R., Interview with Michel Gondry: http://www.pixelsurgeon.com/interviews/interview.php?id=254
Valli, K., Strandholm, T., Sillanmäki, L., and Revonsuo, A.: Dreams are more negative than real life: Implications
for the function of dreaming. Published in: journal Cognition & Emotion, Volume 22, Issue 5 August 2008 , pages
833 - 861
Schoell, W.: “Creating Freddy: A Talk with Wes Craven”. (From: Schoell, W., Spencer, J.: Nightmare Never Ends:
Official Story of Freddy Krueger and the "Nightmare on Elm Street" Films. Virgin Books, 1992) Source:
http://nightmareonelmstreetfilms.com/nightmareinterviewswes.html (Accessed on September 2009)
Wikipedia article titled Themes in Blade Runner: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Themes_in_Blade_Runner (Accessed
on September 2009)
Audio Interview: Peter Bogdanovich interviews Hitchcock, 1963.
Sanderson, L.: Statement from the Lucid Touch website: http://sustenance.va.com.au/LucidTouch/statem.htm
Abbott, S: Interview with Richard Linklater, 2001. Source: http://uk.movies.ign.com/articles/307/307481p1.html
Quittner, J: Are 3-D Movies Ready for Their Closeup?, 2009. Source for the information on the budget of Avatar
(2009): http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1886541.html (Accessed on September 2009)
Collectors Editions, The Art of Destino: http://www.collectorseditions.com/disney/vitae.php?aID=520Destino
Gamestar, Interview with Satoshi Kon, 2004: http://www.gamestar.com/11_04/pause/pause_disc_satoshikon.shtml
Barrier, M.: Feedback – Satoshi Kon, 2007. Source for the information on the budget of Paprika (2006):
http://www.michaelbarrier.com/Feedback/feedback_satoshi_kon.htm (Accessed on September 2009)
Nash Information Services, Box Office History for Disney-Pixar Movies. Source for the budget of WALL-E:
http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/series/Pixar.php (Accessed on September 2009)
BBC News, Hollywood film budgets top $100m, 2004: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/3564377.stm
International Association For the Study of Dreams, INDEX OF FILMS AND DOCUMENTARIES related to dreams:
http://asdreams.org/videofil.htm (Accessed on September 2009)
| 48
Website of Leslie Halpern, author of Dreams on Film: The Cinematic Struggle Between Art and Science (McFarland
& Co, 2003): http://home.roadrunner.com/~lesliehalpern/
Bixler-Thomas, G., Understanding Dreams: Perspectives From the Ancients Through Modern, 1998:
http://www.ondreaming.com/theories/index.htm (Accessed on September 2009)
Wikipedia article titled Video game addiction: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_addiction (Accessed on
September 2009)
Filmography
Science of Sleep (Michel Gondry, 2006)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry, 2004)
The Big Lebowski (Joel Coen, Ethan Coen, 1998)
The Cell (Tarsem Singh, 2005)
Spellbound (Alfred Hitchcock, 1945)
Vertigo (Alfred Hitchcock, 1958)
Open Your Eyes (Alejandro Amenábar, 1997)
The Matrix (Andy Wachowski, Larry Wachowski, 1999)
The Matrix Reloaded (Andy Wachowski, Larry Wachowski, 2003)
The Animatrix (Peter Chung, Andy Jones, Yoshiaki Kawajiri, Takeshi Koike, Mahiro Maeda, Kôji Morimoto
Shinichirô Watanabe, 2003)
Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence (Mamoru Oshii, 2004)
Total Recall (Paul Verhoeven,1990)
Dreamscape (Joseph Ruben, 1984)
Paprika (Satoshi Kon, 2006)
What Dreams May Come (Vincent Ward, 1998)
In Flatliners (Joel Schumacher, 1990)
The Nightmare on Elm Street (Wes Craven, 1984)
A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy's Revenge (Jack Sholder, 1985)
A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (Chuck Russell, 1987)
A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (Renny Harlin, 1988)
A Nightmare on Elm Street: The Dream Child (Stephen Hopkins, 1989)
Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare (Rachel Talalay, 1991)
New Nightmare (Wes Craven, 1994)
In Dreams (Neil Jordan, 1999)
The Gift (Sam Raimi, 2001)
Minority Report (Steven Spielberg, 2002)
The Lord of the Rings (Peter Jackson, 2001)
| 49
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Chris Colombus, 2001)

Eragon (Stefen Fangmeier, 2006)
Dark City (Alex Proyas, 1998)
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (Terry Gilliam, 1998)
A Scanner Darkly (Richard Linklater, 2006)
The Bear (Jean-Jacques Annaud, 1988)
Blueberry (Jan Kounen, 2004)
Altered States (Ken Russell, 1980)
Fight Club (David Fincher, 1999)
A Beautiful Mind (Ron Howard, 2001)
Alice in Wonderland (Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske, 1951)
The Wizard of Oz (Victor Fleming, 1939)
1001 Nights (Mike Smith, 1998)
Ten Nights of Dreams (Yoshitaka Amano, Kon Ichikawa, Akio Jissoji, Masaaki Kawahara, Suzuki Matsuo, Miwa
Nishikawa, Atsushi Shimizu, Takashi Shimizu, Keisuke Toyoshima, Yûdai Yamaguchi, Nobuhiro Yamashita, 2006)
The Triplets of Belleville (Sylvain Chomet, 2003)
Pee Wee’s Big Adventure (Tim Burton, 1985)
Dreams (Akira Kurosawa, 1990)
Manchurian Candidate (John Frankenheimer, 1962)
Millennium Actress (Satoshi Kon, 2001)
The Big Fish (Tim Burton, 2003)
The Wild (Steve Williams, 2006)
The Fall (Tarsem Singh, 2006)
Wild Strawberries (Ingmar Bergman, 1957)
Brazil (Terry Gilliam, 1985)
Nineteen Eighty-Four (Michael Radford, 1984)
Cinderella (Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske, 1950)
8½ (Federico Fellini, 1954)
Vanilla Sky (Cameron Crowe, 2001)
High Fidelity (Stephen Frears, 2000)
Requiem for a Dream (Darren Aronofsky, 2000)
Happiness (Todd Solondz, 1998)
Red’s Dream (John Lasseter, 1987)
Terminator 2 (James Cameron, 1991)
Terminator 3 (Jonathan Mostow, 2003)
| 50
Watchmen (Zack Snyder, 2009)

Braveheart (Mel Gibson, 1995)
Cars (John Lasseter, Joe Ranft, 2006)
Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (Hironobu Sakaguchi, Moto Sakakibara, 2001)
Jacob’s Ladder (Adrian Lyne, 1990)
Stay (Marc Forster, 2005)
Identity (James Mangold, 2003)
Waking Life (Richard Linklater, 2001)
Blade Runner (Ridley Scott, Original Release 1985, Director’s Cut 1992)
Horton Hears a Who (Jimmy Hayward, Steve Martino, 2008)
Sherlock, Jr. (Buster Keaton, 1924)
Fantasia (James Alga, Samuel Armstrong, Ford Beebe, Norman Ferguson, Jim Handley, T. Hee, Wilfred Jackson,
Hamilton Luske, Bill Roberts, Paul Satterfield, 1940)
Toy Story 2 (John Lasseter, Ash Brannon, Lee Unkrich, 1999)
Rosemary’s Baby (Roman Polanski, 1968)
Hulk (Ang Lee, 2003)
Freud (John Huston, 1962)
City of Lost Children (Marc Caro, Jean-Pierre Jeunet, 1995)
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Julian Schnabel, 2007)
Los Olvidados (Luis Buñuel, 1950)
Twelve Monkeys (Terry Gilliam, 1995)
Slipstream (Anthony Hopkins, 2007)
Sleepy Hollow (Tim Burton, 1999)
Naked Lunch (David Cronenberg, 1991)
Aliens (James Cameron, 1986)
The Fly (David Cronenberg, 1986)
Twin Peaks (David Lynch, TV series 1990-1991)
Fantasia 2000 (James Algar, Gaëtan Brizzi, Paul Brizzi, Hendel Butoy, Francis Glebas, Eric Goldberg, Don Hahn,
Pixote Hunt, 1999)
Dumbo (Ben Sharpsteen, 1941)
Ratatouille (Brad Bird, Jan Pinkava, 2007)
Kung Fu Panda (Mark Osborne, John Stevenson, 2008)
Destino (Dominique Monfery, 2003)
WALL-E (Andrew Stanton, 2008)
| 51
Eidesstaatliche Erklärung
Hiermit versichere ich, dass ich die vorliegende Arbeit selbstständig verfasst und keine
anderen als die angegebenen Quellen und Hilfsmittel benutzt habe, dass alle Stellen der
Arbeit, die wörtlich oder sinngemäß aus anderen Quellen übernommen wurden, als solche
kenntlich gemacht wurden und dass die Arbeit in gleicher oder ähnlicher Form noch keiner
Prüfungsbehörde vorgelegt wurde.
Berlin, 10.09.09
| 52

Analysis of Visual Representations of Dreams in Films With Focus On Animation (2009)

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Diplomarbeit zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades eines Diplom Digital Artist

(FH) an der Babelsberg Film School

Dreams and Films

Vorgelegt von: Sadun Kal

1.Prüfer: Prof. Angela Kern

2.Prüfer: Matthias Haase

Berlin, den 10.09.09

1.1. Imagination and Reality

1.2. The Purpose of This Thesis

1.3. Defining Dreams

2. General Characteristics of Filmic Dreams

2.1. Logic and Nature of the Dreams in Films

2.1.1. Regular Dreaming

2.1.2. Technological Dreaming

2.1.3. Supernatural Dreaming

2.1.4. Hallucinations and Delusions

2.2. Themes and Narrative Roles

2.2.1. Dream as the Object of Interest

2.2.2. General Narrative Purposes

2.2.3. Wish Fulfillment and Fantasy

2.2.5. Reality vs. Dream

much less visual, and more sound-based instead.20

2.3.2. Blur and Visual Vagueness

2.3.3. Time and Motion

electrical energy controls video effects and sound.” (Source: http://sustenance.va.com.au/LucidTouch/statem.htm

2.3.4. Fog and Clouds

2.3.5. Color and Look

2.3.6. Contextual Design

Tito: Why does my character have to be a dwarf?

3. The Role of Animation

3.1. Animation and Live Action Dreams

3.2. Advantages of Animation

3.3. Disadvantages of Animation

3.4. Selected Animation Examples and Further Discussion

Various forms of dream sequences can also be seen in 3D animation projects.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Chris Colombus, 2001)

Watchmen (Zack Snyder, 2009)

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