Movie review: What Dreams May Come

This is a very difficult movie to review, even to describe. It is a modernisation of the myth of Orpheus and Euridice, with Robyn Williams playing the Orpheus character. It is a true modernisation, in that the tale is transmogrified, the details, plot and theme cleverly enhanced, so that it somehow fits the 20th century context. It is an effects showcase, in ways different from Star Wars or Tron, and I am tempted to note that modern computer-generated moviecraft suits such mythology perfectly. Yet it is still somewhat thin and over-emotional a movie.

The plot (and I am careful not to spoil some clever twists) involves an initial section where Williams' character swiftly meets the love of his life, has a family, loses his children, rebuilds his existence with his wife, and is killed in an accident where he is trying to help another. He subsequently comes to grips with his afterlife, discovering "how it works" the way a baby must figure out how life works. His wife then commits suicide in her grief, and he undertakes to try and rescue her, which forms the last part of the story.

The theme of the original Orpheus myth is perhaps that love overcomes all, and this figures here. However, to the credit of the movie maker, there is more to the thematic content of this movie. It has a modern message, perhaps that "Hell is what you make it", though I shall not venture into psychiatric reflections on how this might be tied in with suicide and reincarnation... see this for yourself.

My colleague and film enthusiast, Geoffrey, having already seen this movie, passed on to me the comment that it could be seen as rather schmaltzy, and it cuts a fine line on that front. Indeed, my first criticism upon emerging (and you do emerge from this one), was that there are long, unrelieved, portions of heavy, tear-jerking material. Well, the whole myth is about death, suffering, joy, intense love, etc., and not so much about frivolity and good humour. Perhaps this comes with the territory; you must approach this knowing that `light' can describe beer, cake, some forms of entertainment, but definitley not a quick tour of hell.

The afterworld is a tremendous vehicle for cinematic effects. The sheer joy that eventually comes to new arrivals perfectly camouflages the enthusiasm of the digital animators, so that you are not left with that Tron feeling that they had to scrape up a few plot dregs to make use of a great animation idea, nor do you strain to catch and analyse each manifestation of industrial magic as in Star Wars: heaven (and elsewhere) is an effect, it is not brief, it does not seem false. There are other events in the movie that might have been achieved with effects of the cinematic kind, and the budget could not have noticed them, but they are done with live-theatre techniques, springing from the author's pen, not the programmer's pointing device. Full marks here.

Robyn Williams acts well, as he does in any part that you can see suits him. The other roles were not demanding, in acting terms. (I am reminded of the Python skit where Cleese as a famous actor describes emotions in idiotically simple terms, and the complexity of Shakespearian plays mostly in the number of words you have to remember... Romeo and Juliet was good at 3042 words and a lot of climbing and kissing, but the cleaning up after Othello was a bugger.) Suffice to say that you will have no complaints about acting, but you might about the characterisation allowed by the story.