Writer/director Kristoffer Borgli’s Dream Scenario stars Nicolas Cage as Paul Matthews, a frustrated writer/ professor who, for no apparent reason, starts appearing in people’s dreams. As the phenomenon becomes more widespread, Paul finds himself trending, and our reluctant hero attempts to utilise his new-found fame to kick-start a writing career.
Kristoffer Borgli blends biting satire with surreal comedy into a warped flight of fancy, which burgeons into a noggin-bothering nightmare when the dreams turn bad and Paul’s life falls apart. Topped with a career-best performance from Cage, whose whining, cranky angst makes him at times both lovable and loathsome, Dream Scenario is a tantalising near masterpiece in its melding of multiple genres with flecks of Woody Allen, Charlie Kaufman, and Paul Verhoeven throughout.
Painfully funny family drama bleeds seamlessly into fantasy/horror, enriched with subtexts, themes and social commentary about cancel culture before going paradoxically sci-fi at the end. Subplots involving Paul being plagiarised by a colleague, seduced by a PA and prostituted into advertising by a soapy publicity manager (Michael Cera), all add to the A24/Ari Aster produced cacophony; for Dream Scenario subverts, bamboozles, deviates, then defies expectation while being beautifully batshit with a knack to constantly captivate.
Despite a slightly elongated narrative (it could’ve been a tighter 90 minutes, and maybe a masterpiece), Borgli’s second feature, after 2022’s Sick of Myself, is an exquisitely twisted, face-achingly funny and explosive visual delight, laced with warmth, wry irony and surprising frights. With so many mid-budget movies being shunted onto streaming platforms, it’s a blessing to see this trippy, cerebral cortex-kneading treat beam with such brilliance on the big screen.
DREAM SCENARIO opens in UK cinemas on November 10th
