Bad Dreams (1988)

User Rating:

4.9/10   

Director:

Andrew Fleming

Writers (WGA):

Andrew Fleming (story) &
Michael Dick (story) ...

Release Date:

8 April 1988 (USA)

Genre:

Horror | Thriller

Tagline:

The Scream You Don't Hear... Is Your Own

Plot:

In the mid-'70s, a cult group called Unity Field commits mass suicide, but a young girl survives. After...

Plot Keywords:

Suicide | Mass Suicide | Cult | Coma | Psychiatrist

Cast

Jennifer Rubin	...	Cynthia
Bruce Abbott	...	Dr. Alex Karmen
Richard Lynch	...	Harris
Dean Cameron	...	Ralph
Harris Yulin	...	Dr. Berrisford
Susan Barnes	...	Connie
John Scott Clough	...	Victor
Elizabeth Daily	...	Lana (as E.G. Daily)
Damita Jo Freeman	...	Gilda
Louis Giambalvo	...	Ed
Susan Ruttan	...	Miriam
Sy Richardson	...	Detective Wasserman
Missy Francis	...	Young Cynthia
Sheila Scott-Wilkenson	...	Hettie
Ben Kronen	...	Edgar

Runtime:

Australia:80 min | 84 min (FMC Library Print)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Certification:

Finland:(Banned) (1988) | Finland:K-18 (re-rating) | UK:18 (cut) | Australia:R | France:-12 | USA:R | Iceland:16 | Norway:18 (video rating) | Norway:(Banned) (1988-2003) (cinema release)

Company:

No Frills Film Production

Quotes:

Cynthia: [looking up at the vent] Where's Connie and Ed?... Where's Connie and Ed?
Harris: With us!

Movie Connections:

Featured in Ghost (1990)

Soundtrack:

My Way

Worth seeing for the cast, in any event.

In 1975, a girl named Cynthia managed to survive a suicide pact engineered by charismatic / creepy cult leader Clayton Harris (Richard Lynch). In 1988, Cynthia emerges as a young adult (Jennifer Rubin) from a coma and is placed under the care of kindly psychiatrist Alex Karmen (Bruce Abbott). Soon enough, all of her fellow group therapy patients are killing themselves in increasingly graphic ways, and Cynthia, who is seeing Harris's charred remains repeatedly, believes that he is the one killing them.

"Bad Dreams" is a fairly decent horror film working the psychology of cults and their gurus into its somewhat intriguing plot. It shows how good intentions and ideas can be distorted into something monstrous (Harris's intention is the ultimate expression of love and unity, hence the name of his cult, "Unity Fields".). It incorporates the use of a MacGuffin in its plot to good effect, and the psychiatry angle adds another layer to the proceedings.

Michele Burke supplies great make-up for Lynch as well as some pretty nasty splatter. The highlight is a double suicide involving voluntarily jumping into a turbine (when blood starts showering down on Cynthia, it's a very "Carrie"-esque moment). Good visual imagery helps - scene transitions and color schemes are particularly noteworthy. The offbeat soundtrack includes classics such as "Time Has Come Today", a truly warped punk rendition of "My Way", and the Guns 'n' Roses hit "Sweet Child O' Mine", in its first inclusion in a motion picture.

The film delivers some fine "Boo!" moments, and is overall fairly creepy and uneasy, thanks in no small part to the Harris character and Lynch's performance. One can see how some people would fall under the spell of a person like that.

Rubin is quite gorgeous and appealing, and Abbott does well as the well-meaning shrink. Harris Yulin, Susan Ruttan, Susan Barnes, Sy Richardson, Louis Giambalvo, Damita Jo Freeman, and E.G. Daily do fine supporting work. Ruttan in particular offers a notable contrast to the role of Roxanne on 'L.A. Law.' Dean Cameron supplies much of the humor, improvising his best lines (you have to listen closely to catch one of them). And Charles Fleischer, voice of Roger Rabbit, has an amusing cameo.

One of the best sequences has Abbott playing out a revenge fantasy against Yulin.

"Bad Dreams" is a reasonably entertaining 80's horror flick that at least wraps itself up in record time, running a scant 85 minutes.

7/10