laire Cooper (Bening) has had psychedelic dreams all her life. Even though they seldom make sense to her when they happen, they do come true. Now there's a little girl missing, and a killer has her. Claire has seen a little girl in her dreams, walking through an apple orchard and holding the hand of an adult with evil intentions. She's sure that the missing girl is still alive and that there's time to save her.
Claire's husband, Paul (Aidan Quinn), is skeptical. But he knows Claire's dreams have come true before, so he goes to the police on her behalf. However, the police detective is more than a little skeptical. When the little girl's body is found nowhere near an apple orchard, Claire decides to let it go. Her daughter, Rebecca, is in a school play, and they have to get ready for it.
After the play, Rebecca turns up missing. To Claire's horror, she realizes the dream she had wasn't of the past, it was of the future. As Claire's dreams intensify, she discovers that she and the killer are somehow linked. Visions of an apple orchard and a flooded city haunt her dreams, and in one she sees a little boy chained to a bed as the room he's in begins to fill with water.
As Claire's mind fills with the killer's madness, she struggles to save her family, as well as her own sanity. However, even Paul begins to question her actions, and eventually she's committed to a mental institution. Now Claire realizes that her only chance to find the killer is through her dreams.
Haunting, but who cares?
Like a bad dream, In Dreams (based Bari Wood's novel Doll's Eyes) has some stunning visual moments that don't make a lot of sense, though it's easy to get caught up in the kaleidoscope of images that might make up a killer's mind. The impressive scenes of a city underwater add a haunting quality to the film. Unfortunately, none of these bits has a lot to do with the movie, and the flooded city is not used to any great effect.
In fact, for a horror movie, there's surprisingly little mystery here. The killer's identity is quickly revealed, and Claire's dreams give a pretty clear idea of why he turned out so badly. There's no doubt Claire will end up battling him in the end. And, as with too many movies about serial killers, the killer seems to have a supernatural ability to affect the physical universe, as well as get into his victim's mind.
The biggest mystery here is why the screenplay makes so little sense. The husband may or may not be having an affair, but that little plot point goes nowhere. How does the killer manage to get into a dog's mind? Why does Claire end up with the exact same room in the mental institution that the killer spent time in? Could it be that the killer has control over her psychiatrist's dreams too? In fact, why not snatch her at the beginning of the movie? Of course, that would make a much shorter film.
Director Neil Jordan is responsible for generating a fair amount of the tension In Dreams manages to develop, and for creating the film's haunting feel. However, he's done much better before (Interview with a Vampire), and to his discredit he helped write this mess. He also took an exceptional cast and gave them roles that offer only one-note characterizations. Only the talented Bening manages to come out well, and that's because she goes nuts so gracefully.
