One Dream RushScholars, shamans, and scientists have contemplated dreams since time immemorial--its purpose, role in the arts, and even its significance as a manifestation of our primal urges and deepest fears. Dreams don't conform to the rules of our waking lives, and are inherently individualistic; it could be said that dreams are the subconscious mind's version of "art". One Dream Rush is a short film comprised of forty-two micro-films, each lasting forty-two seconds, preceded by a title card with the respective filmmaker's name. Each film is self-contained and unique, and are consistently open to interpretation.
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None of the rapid-fire micro-films in One Dream Rush approach a traditional narrative, since it is virtually impossible to tell a cohesive story in less than a minute. Even in episodes where there is significant dialogue, it is obscured or muddled by design, or in a language other than English, without the aid of subtitles. The audience is required to interpret the meaning of each film, and contemplate the impression that it leaves behind. The experience is akin to channel surfing or sprinting through an art gallery, placing first impressions at the forefront. This "forty-two second film showcase" includes a diverse gathering of filmmakers, from directors like Kenneth Anger and Leos Carax, to actor Tadanobu Asano and author Grant Morrison. Some films are sharp and tightly edited, while others could be mistaken for an unusual home movie. This speaks to the idea that dreams are both universal and individual, shared by all of humanity from all walks of life, with each dream a reflection of the dreamer. Many of the films come across as creepy or bizarre, which underscores how our society rarely embraces dreams as a part of our psychology, because of the challenges that come in interpreting or understanding them. Descriptors like "experimental" and "abstract" are used to sidestep the hard questions about what the sounds and images say to them. Dreams force us to ask questions where answers are not guaranteed; overcoming these objections is as important in appreciating One Dream Rush as it is when contemplating a dream.
There are some consistent motifs throughout One Dream Rush, especially the act of dreaming itself. Several of the films deal with eyes--what we close when we sleep and dream; even the camera is essentially an eye capturing a "dream" of reality in a film. In Leos Carax's Naked Eyes, the creepy narrator describes how he ogles his attractive new neighbor, while commenting that she is blind. When she removes her top, he corrects himself and claims that she is merely "shy", since there are "eyes" are where her nipples would be. In Jonathan Caouette's Rotaurorae, a family is up late watching a bizarre television program. When a woman (played by Chloë Sevigny) asks to see a younger boy's eyes, they are excited to see that they both have glowing red eyes--like in a photograph where the subject stared into the flash. In Charles Burnett's 42 Second Dream, a man is hypnotized and dreams of kites and meadows, viewed through a negative color filter--an inverted perspective of reality. In Yung Chang's Alishan, a throng of excited people take a train to the mountain, where they watch the sun rise; their eyes are shielded by sunglasses. Perhaps the quintessential entry in One Dream Rush would be from David Lynch--his Dream #7. In this stop-motion animated film, a floating hand with an eye in the center wafts by, while an egg-like shape manifests in front of a stage curtain. The egg cracks, and both another eye and a mouth alternately emerge from the shape, which begins to resemble a head. The top of the "head" cracks open, and a golden orb emerges from the cranium. It is a common saying that eyes are the window to the soul. It could be argued that dreams are the transmission of the soul into our consciousness, either the unresolved flotsam of our waking lives or some other deeper, existential facet that haunts our psyches, forced to confront them when we close our eyes.
Nightmares confront us with dark and unsettling sensations that our conscious minds would like to bury away; these are explored in One Dream Rush as well. Abel Ferrara's Dream Piece shows the collapse of the World Trade Center during the September 11 terrorist attacks through archival footage, complete with scan lines recalling a cathode ray television set. The footage is played in reverse, as if trying to undo the catastrophic tragedy. Gaspar Noé's 42 depicts a mud-encrusted figure with a grim expression, standing in almost complete silence and in front of a black background. This unsettling image gives way to a piercing shriek at the end, emulating those jumps in our nightmares that jolt us out of sleep. Kenneth Anger's Death opens One Dream Rush, and shows a series of death masks and the head of a boar, along with a body laid out in deathly repose. This recalls the famous Latin phrase, "memento mori", meant to remind us that all of us will die one day. Fear of death is an intrinsic part of our instincts, and this piece emphasizes how it is carried over into our dreams. There are a few entries which deal with the fear of evil itself, via malevolent depictions of Satan and other disturbing rituals. Michele Civetta's Astarte opens with dialogue played backwards, alongside a showcase of assorted graphic content, like nudity, blood, and vaguely pagan rituals. Brian Butler's Night of Pan features rapid images of devil worshipers surrounded by black candles, cloaks, and other associated paraphernalia. Jon Coleman's Bit Rare Fiend opens with a human autopsy while something combining a Pentecostal service or exorcism plays on the audio track, complete with a boy speaking in tongues, and sharing how the devil told him to kill himself. These contributions to One Dream Rush suggest that the realm of dreams is also the playground of devils, where our id runs rampant, indulging in fantasies that would be perverse and monstrous in reality.
Other elements found in One Dream Rush include the presence of water and childhood, and how they sometimes go together. Griffin Marcus's Tiempo depicts everything from a rain dance, blood, soldiers, and even a cheetah, to a woman in a pool of water, apparently preparing to give birth, while Lola Schnabel's Aqua-Rêve moves with a water-like fluidity. Chris Graham's Moe Moe A and Carlos Reygadas's Babies Are Happy focus extensively on infants or children, suggesting that dreaming places our subconscious in a child-like state, like a regression to infancy. Mike Figgis's Dream Forward includes a slow (if creepy) lullaby played on a piano, as a rapid barrage of imagery flashes like a synthetic REM cycle. Other micro-films defiantly avoid easy classification, and exist solely as themselves for the audience's consideration--isolated bubbles of meditative contemplation. Rajan Mehta's Argia depicts a trio of semi-nude women in face paint, standing on a stark beach. The woman in the center of the group looks on at her tearful reflection following a flashback to some sorrowful memory. Tadanobu Asano's For My Dear Dead Dog is narrated and performed by Asano (in Japanese); grief-stricken, he digs a grave in the dirt with his hands. Some of these entries appear strictly meditative, as though explaining their significance would undermine its purpose. Asia Argento's S/he depicts a group of transgender women partying, while James Franco's Untitled is a static shot of a shack that is blown to bits with dynamite. Terence Koh's Year of the Rabbit is a black and white film showing a white rabbit on a blanket--and that's it. The narration in Mote Sinabel's Catharsis carries a tone of defeatism and apathy, with imagery that recalls Ingmar Bergman's Persona. Dee Poon's coyly titled An Exercise in Futility shows a woman successfully putting together a house of cards in a room full of fans. Is this a metaphor for the Sisyphus-like struggle of life itself, or merely a nugget of cinematic playfulness? Do these episodes have any larger meaning? The answers are as individual as the viewer, because--like dreams--art is subjective.
Recommended for: Fans of a collection of quick and potent contemplations about dreams, without the safety net of a cohesive narrative. One Dream Rush is designed to provoke the audience into considering how the various films affect them on an instinctive level. The brevity of the entries is also meant to instill a sense of urgency, encouraging unfiltered questions about ourselves and what it means to dream.
There are some consistent motifs throughout One Dream Rush, especially the act of dreaming itself. Several of the films deal with eyes--what we close when we sleep and dream; even the camera is essentially an eye capturing a "dream" of reality in a film. In Leos Carax's Naked Eyes, the creepy narrator describes how he ogles his attractive new neighbor, while commenting that she is blind. When she removes her top, he corrects himself and claims that she is merely "shy", since there are "eyes" are where her nipples would be. In Jonathan Caouette's Rotaurorae, a family is up late watching a bizarre television program. When a woman (played by Chloë Sevigny) asks to see a younger boy's eyes, they are excited to see that they both have glowing red eyes--like in a photograph where the subject stared into the flash. In Charles Burnett's 42 Second Dream, a man is hypnotized and dreams of kites and meadows, viewed through a negative color filter--an inverted perspective of reality. In Yung Chang's Alishan, a throng of excited people take a train to the mountain, where they watch the sun rise; their eyes are shielded by sunglasses. Perhaps the quintessential entry in One Dream Rush would be from David Lynch--his Dream #7. In this stop-motion animated film, a floating hand with an eye in the center wafts by, while an egg-like shape manifests in front of a stage curtain. The egg cracks, and both another eye and a mouth alternately emerge from the shape, which begins to resemble a head. The top of the "head" cracks open, and a golden orb emerges from the cranium. It is a common saying that eyes are the window to the soul. It could be argued that dreams are the transmission of the soul into our consciousness, either the unresolved flotsam of our waking lives or some other deeper, existential facet that haunts our psyches, forced to confront them when we close our eyes.
Nightmares confront us with dark and unsettling sensations that our conscious minds would like to bury away; these are explored in One Dream Rush as well. Abel Ferrara's Dream Piece shows the collapse of the World Trade Center during the September 11 terrorist attacks through archival footage, complete with scan lines recalling a cathode ray television set. The footage is played in reverse, as if trying to undo the catastrophic tragedy. Gaspar Noé's 42 depicts a mud-encrusted figure with a grim expression, standing in almost complete silence and in front of a black background. This unsettling image gives way to a piercing shriek at the end, emulating those jumps in our nightmares that jolt us out of sleep. Kenneth Anger's Death opens One Dream Rush, and shows a series of death masks and the head of a boar, along with a body laid out in deathly repose. This recalls the famous Latin phrase, "memento mori", meant to remind us that all of us will die one day. Fear of death is an intrinsic part of our instincts, and this piece emphasizes how it is carried over into our dreams. There are a few entries which deal with the fear of evil itself, via malevolent depictions of Satan and other disturbing rituals. Michele Civetta's Astarte opens with dialogue played backwards, alongside a showcase of assorted graphic content, like nudity, blood, and vaguely pagan rituals. Brian Butler's Night of Pan features rapid images of devil worshipers surrounded by black candles, cloaks, and other associated paraphernalia. Jon Coleman's Bit Rare Fiend opens with a human autopsy while something combining a Pentecostal service or exorcism plays on the audio track, complete with a boy speaking in tongues, and sharing how the devil told him to kill himself. These contributions to One Dream Rush suggest that the realm of dreams is also the playground of devils, where our id runs rampant, indulging in fantasies that would be perverse and monstrous in reality.
Other elements found in One Dream Rush include the presence of water and childhood, and how they sometimes go together. Griffin Marcus's Tiempo depicts everything from a rain dance, blood, soldiers, and even a cheetah, to a woman in a pool of water, apparently preparing to give birth, while Lola Schnabel's Aqua-Rêve moves with a water-like fluidity. Chris Graham's Moe Moe A and Carlos Reygadas's Babies Are Happy focus extensively on infants or children, suggesting that dreaming places our subconscious in a child-like state, like a regression to infancy. Mike Figgis's Dream Forward includes a slow (if creepy) lullaby played on a piano, as a rapid barrage of imagery flashes like a synthetic REM cycle. Other micro-films defiantly avoid easy classification, and exist solely as themselves for the audience's consideration--isolated bubbles of meditative contemplation. Rajan Mehta's Argia depicts a trio of semi-nude women in face paint, standing on a stark beach. The woman in the center of the group looks on at her tearful reflection following a flashback to some sorrowful memory. Tadanobu Asano's For My Dear Dead Dog is narrated and performed by Asano (in Japanese); grief-stricken, he digs a grave in the dirt with his hands. Some of these entries appear strictly meditative, as though explaining their significance would undermine its purpose. Asia Argento's S/he depicts a group of transgender women partying, while James Franco's Untitled is a static shot of a shack that is blown to bits with dynamite. Terence Koh's Year of the Rabbit is a black and white film showing a white rabbit on a blanket--and that's it. The narration in Mote Sinabel's Catharsis carries a tone of defeatism and apathy, with imagery that recalls Ingmar Bergman's Persona. Dee Poon's coyly titled An Exercise in Futility shows a woman successfully putting together a house of cards in a room full of fans. Is this a metaphor for the Sisyphus-like struggle of life itself, or merely a nugget of cinematic playfulness? Do these episodes have any larger meaning? The answers are as individual as the viewer, because--like dreams--art is subjective.
Recommended for: Fans of a collection of quick and potent contemplations about dreams, without the safety net of a cohesive narrative. One Dream Rush is designed to provoke the audience into considering how the various films affect them on an instinctive level. The brevity of the entries is also meant to instill a sense of urgency, encouraging unfiltered questions about ourselves and what it means to dream.