What Dreams May Come (1998)
Directed by Vincent Ward
After Chris Nielsen dies in a car accident, he is guided through the afterlife by his spirit guide, Albert. His new world is beautiful and can be whatever Chris imagines. Even his children are there. But, when his wife, Annie, commits suicide and is sent to hell, Chris ignores Albert's warnings and journeys there to save her. Upon arrival, Chris finds that rescuing Annie will be more difficult than he'd imagined.
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11 films that influenced What Dreams May Come
What critics say influenced What Dreams May Come
Some memorables include Heaven Can Wait (1978), Made in Heaven (1987), Ghost (1990), and, earlier this year, City Of Angels .
Some memorables include Heaven Can Wait (1978), Made in Heaven (1987), Ghost (1990), and, earlier this year, City Of Angels .
Like Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life, What Dreams May Come (title courtesy of Hamlet's "To be or not to be" soliloquy) is at its best when its characters are in Hell and at its worst when they're in Heaven.
For those thinking I'm just a hardened cynic, I've enjoyed and been touched by many other films -- such as Steven Spielberg's "Always," the movie "Ghost" and the great "Heaven Can Wait" that all dealt with the afterlife in their own special ways.
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Take one part "Ghost."
Worse, it fails to establish the metaphysical limits and felt experiences of the dead Chris, whereas Ghost clearly and succinctly outlined Patrick Swayze's capacities as a walking spirit.
For those thinking I'm just a hardened cynic, I've enjoyed and been touched by many other films -- such as Steven Spielberg's "Always," the movie "Ghost" and the great "Heaven Can Wait" that all dealt with the afterlife in their own special ways.
His Map of the Human Heart is a little-known but ambitious epic filled with startling visions of an Eskimo culture, the bombing of Dresden, and a love affair that spans a lifetime.
And then, in 1993, he made the great "Map of the Human Heart," about the odyssey of an Eskimo boy from Alaska in the 1930s to London in the war, and from a great love affair to high adventure.
Director Vincent Ward ("Map of the Human Heart") compounds the problem by telling the story at too leisurely a pace it feels like it takes two hours just to get to the meat of the tale.
A New Zealand filmmaker who made the extraordinary "The Navigator" and the quite respectable "Map of the Human Heart," he has set aside, at least for now, the creativity of his early small-budget efforts.
New Zealand director Vincent Ward ("Map of the Human Heart") seems to have been run over by his own maudlin machine.
Its hard enough acting against a blue screen and with the wooden material by Ron Bass ( How Stella Got Her Groove Back , My Best Friends Wedding , Waiting to Exhale) and the inept direction by New Zealander Vincent Ward, his last effort being 1992s Map of the Human Heart, a modest love story with breathtaking visuals.
The counter-example most explicitly invited by What Dreams May Come is a simple, delightful film from Iran called Gabbeh , made in 1997.
Max gets the chance to stand around and look authoritative, while I suspect he was wondering how he’d fallen so far from The Seventh Seal, The Exoricst, and Hannah and Her Sisters.
Both Albert and another spiritual guide played by Max von Sydowa sly if overdetermined addition to the cast, having played Jesus and the Devil in his career, as well as Death's vigorous adversary in Bergman's The Seventh Sealattempt to explain how Chris might win Annie back.
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Robin Williams is in fine form here, restrained but passionate, as he was in The Fisher King and Good Will Hunting, movies that proved he was more than just a comedian.
One method favors the Tasmanian-devil energy and gonzo comic spirit of The Fisher King , Good Morning, Vietnam, or his voice-only work in Aladdin, the latter of which still probably counts as his best screen performance.
What Dreams May Come was adapted from a novel by Richard Matheson, whose fascination with higher planes of existence dates back at least as far as his script for 1957's The Incredible Shrinking Man.