Dreams

Inspiring, based on dreams... and still touching to the heart

I love this movie because Kurosawa really lets his love of painting show through, and it's not just with the Van Gogh segment. Throughout the film Kurosawa uses color is such an emotional way. And these colors almost look like they were painted on with water colors, it makes for a beautiful effect. On top of that he really lets the visuals tell the story rather than dialog, much like a painting would. I think this is the perfect example of how color can be very important in movies, something which is often forgotten.

It's just a truly unique and interesting film to watch. If you're an Akira Kurosawa fan than this needs to be on your watch list.

This movie stands out among Kurosawa's films when it comes to structure. It consists of eight short parts, which you may watch totally independent of each other. The common feature is that they're all based on dreams that Kurosawa himself had experienced. Also, for the first time he wrote the script all on his own.
And there are several good stories here. But they are not, perhaps with the exception of the first two, especially dreamy. In those, the main character is a child and the dreams are actually a bit scary - without a doubt nightmares for a child. But of course, Kurosawa's biggest and repeated nightmare comes at the end. The last three dreams are devoted to the fear of nuclear weapons.
Dreams is probably the film I would call the most uneven of all his films, some of it is pure gold.

Akira Kurosawa's Dreams is essentially an assemblage of eight stories, or as the viewers will soon discover, eight dreams - each belonging to Kurosawa himself. This is Kurosawa at his most self-reflexive but we the audience are taken to the very visual beauty of the great director's mind itself. Despite lacking a narrative fluency or coherent link between each 'dream' each individual dream consists of personal stories and strong messages which are all very relatable.

Consequently the consistent main character in each of the dreams is supposedly Kurosawa himself, only referred to as 'I' this character clearly reflects the point of view in which Kurosawa supposedly experienced the dreams reflected in this film. Although the film has an almost too long running time of near two hours, despite this, I really enjoyed each dream.

P.S Martin Scorsese plays Vincent Van Gogh so it is worth a look if only for that short appearance.

Like walking in a dream that doesn't belong to you, but somehow you feel part of it. Nature and music are present along with a distorted narration that fits perfectly.

Dreams

Inspiring, based on dreams... and still touching to the heart

I have fallen asleep watching this twice, if that is an indication to how engaging this film is, but I have the feeling that when Kurosawa decided to share his dreams as a collection of shorts that engaging an audience was not his intention.

Only in a dream could a person create such imaginative scenery and odd characters. My favourite segments were the first two, most likely from dreams that Kurosawa had as a young boy.

A great portrait of both the world of dreams and Japan's culture. Kurosawa was definitely a genius.

Worth it to watch Scorsese play Van Gogh.

I love this movie because Kurosawa really lets his love of painting show through, and it's not just with the Van Gogh segment. Throughout the film Kurosawa uses color is such an emotional way. And these colors almost look like they were painted on with water colors, it makes for a beautiful effect. On top of that he really lets the visuals tell the story rather than dialog, much like a painting would. I think this is the perfect example of how color can be very important in movies, something which is often forgotten.

It's just a truly unique and interesting film to watch. If you're an Akira Kurosawa fan than this needs to be on your watch list.