Dream Analysis

Not too long ago, George Lucas took enough time away from making Greedo shoot first to do a magazine interview about his inspiration for the original STAR WARS trilogy. And as he tells it, the whole thing – cue harp music – started with a dream.

While history proves that his “dream” was most likely a 1958 samurai movie entitled HIDDEN FORTRESS, Lucas nevertheless raises an interesting point. Dreams, aside from fueling the car ahead of me in traffic this morning (according to its bumper sticker, anyway) are the stomping ground of invention, creativity and – benefit of the doubt – the occasional six-part space opera. But for being such great source material, they absolutely suck at three act structure.

Take, for instance, the dream I had on Saturday night. In it, my brother Michael and I are American soldiers during World War 2, and one of several teams with orders to destroy a Nazi stronghold. Finding the target – a chateau high in the alps – filled with celebrating Allied soldiers, we discover that the place and its siege-worthy stores of food and ale were abandoned long before the first team arrived. So, accepting a kindly British officer’s invitation, we join the party and dig into two bloody steaks. Looking for something to wash them down, I stumble across a hidden radio closet where the British officer – a Nazi double agent – is relaying word that his trap has been sprung. The food and ale are all poisoned, meaning that while the steaks were once medium rare…they’re now life or death (ignore the spelling error – the pun was too good to pass up). Sprinting back to the table, I knock the utensils out of Michael’s hand and brief him on the situation. With no way of knowing whether we’ve taken enough poison to be affected – or how long our unwitting brothers in arms have before they all drop dead – we share a solemn nod and start concocting a plan.

And that’s when I woke up, dying for a glass of water.

So what the hell, subconscious? Just like the time when I woke up before Milla Jovovich and I could imprison the alien overlord inside a mine shaft, you’re giving me all setup and no payoff. Which is why, in the spirit of Saturday’s dream, I am officially declaring war. Either you dream up the clever plan that allows me and Michael to find an antidote, topple the Fatherland and rescue a couple of grateful Fräuleins, or I take the George Lucas approach and slowly kill you with repeated viewings of Kurosawa movies. And since I’m such a nice guy, I’ll give you some time to think it over.

Heck – I’ll even let you sleep on it.