Dream A40

I've been wanting to watch this film for a while but couldn't find anywhere online to watch it. After some looking around I then decided to buy the BFI DVD, Encounters, which had this film as one of the featured short stories.

Now that I've watched it, I don't know what to think. Completely subverted all my expectations. Started off with a nice little road trip and suddenly we've got nooses, entrapment and death. Now, I understand it's experimental/surrealist style, but at the time of watching I was going what the fuck. This is dark and scary and uncomfortable which of course is the intended reaction.

After processing it and thinking about it some more, I really liked it. Certainly made it's mark. Viewing it as the metaphorical psychological experience of the young man, made everything click for me. The desire, the longing, the shame, the fear etc. Never feeling safe. Always feeling like you're going to get caught. Constantly perceiving every worst case scenario because that's what you had to do to survive. It's devastatingly poetic. They've done a great job of putting onto film, emotions and experiences which are indescribable without personal experience. I think this film is brilliant in that way. It's soul crushingly sad but it's important because it was all real and true back then and even now in some parts of the world/for some people. Really made me appreciate having come out the other side of my personal experience.

Overall, it's definitely worth the watch and certainly worth the money I paid for the DVD. For a film which was released only 4 years after Victim (1961), besides this not being a mainstream feature length film, I thought it was phenomenal. The power and weight behind it all. The trauma and pain behind it all. While gut wrenching, somehow beautiful how those people at the time channelled that into making this in efforts of making themselves seen and heard, even when the world didn’t want to look. Pretty amazing. Great film. A haunting insight into the struggles and losses endured by those before us.

I've been wanting to watch this film for a while but couldn't find anywhere online to watch it. After some looking around I then decided to buy the BFI DVD, Encounters, which had this film as one of the featured short stories.

Now that I've watched it, I don't know what to think. Completely subverted all my expectations. Started off with a nice little road trip and suddenly we've got nooses, entrapment and death. Now, I understand it's experimental/surrealist style, but at the time of watching I was going what the fuck. This is dark and scary and uncomfortable which of course is the intended reaction.

After processing it and thinking about it some more, I really liked it. Certainly made it's mark. Viewing it as the metaphorical psychological experience of the young man, made everything click for me. The desire, the longing, the shame, the fear etc. Never feeling safe. Always feeling like you're going to get caught. Constantly perceiving every worst case scenario because that's what you had to do to survive. It's devastatingly poetic. They've done a great job of putting onto film, emotions and experiences which are indescribable without personal experience. I think this film is brilliant in that way. It's soul crushingly sad but it's important because it was all real and true back then and even now in some parts of the world/for some people. Really made me appreciate having come out the other side of my personal experience.

Overall, it's definitely worth the watch and certainly worth the money I paid for the DVD. For a film which was released only 4 years after Victim (1961), besides this not being a mainstream feature length film, I thought it was phenomenal. The power and weight behind it all. The trauma and pain behind it all. While gut wrenching, somehow beautiful how those people at the time channelled that into making this in efforts of making themselves seen and heard, even when the world didn’t want to look. Pretty amazing. Great film. A haunting insight into the struggles and losses endured by those before us.