Review of What Dreams May Come (1998) by Mike S — 24 May 2011
This movie about the afterlife is visually stunning, but I found the story a bit muddled and ordinary. The afterlife turns out to be different for everyone. Each person inhabits a personal heaven that he or she creates with his or her dreams and desires.
The only exception appears to be suicides, who are relegated to a hell of grayness and ignorance of their own deaths. Robin Williams's deceased character tries to rescue his suicide wife from such a hell (she killed herself because her children and then her husband died in separate car accidents).
On this level, it's a fairly standard story of true love and soul mates. But it looks gorgeous, and some of the movie is a travelogue as we are given a tour of heaven. Williams's character inhabits a heaven that is like an oil painting, richer and more colourful than any real landscape.
The paint smears as he walks through his heaven! In the early part of the film, Williams can't seem to decide whether he's in a comedy or a drama, as he veers from wise-cracking to serious. By the end, he's settled down and the performance is reliably solid, as are the performances of the rest of the cast.
The core idea is interesting, but ultimately the story seems a bit thin for such a beautiful world.
This review of What Dreams May Come (1998) was written by Mike S on 24 May 2011.
What Dreams May Come has generally received positive reviews.
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