I thought to put together a list of all movies about or related to Lucid Dreams. These are in no particular order but are divided to fiction and documentaries. I will continuously add to this list as I find or learn about more movies and will add some descriptions or comments as I watch more of these.
I wanted to add links to where these are available to view online but that keeps changing and it depends where you are in the world. For now, I am linking to IMDB.
Here we go…
Fiction:
- Waking Life – Perhaps one of the most know lucid dreaming movies, and a hybrid of filmed animation and partially documentary style film.
- Inception – One of my favorite movies and one whose images are used in nearly every lucid dreaming article these days.
- Vanilla Sky (which is an american remake of Abre los ojos (Open your eyes))
- Lucid Dream – A Korean film on netflix
- Falling Water – TV Show
- Paprika – A spectacular Japanese animated film
- The Science of Sleep
- The Matrix – Where do I even start about this one? I might have to write whole separate post in this case.
- Nightmare on Elm Street
- The Cell
- The Good Night
- Dreamscape
- Alice in Wonderland
- When a Man Falls (in the Forest)
- Stay
Movies Experientially about Lucid Dreams:
- Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
- Total Recall
- Source Code
- The Thirteenth Floor
- What Dreams May Come
- eXistenZ
Documentaries:
Did I miss any lucid dreaming movies? Let me know.
There are also a ton of short films, what do you think, should I include those?
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The short films would be interesting, too. Especially if they are somewhat good and available. I don’t think I know any about lucid dreaming, yet.
And yes, you missed some movies. Here are some that come to mind:
Alice in Wonderland (2010) – The entire movie is about a lucid dream.
When a Man Falls in the Forest (2007) – It tells different stories that. One is about a man learning to lucid dream.
A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) – I haven’t seen it (really don’t like this kind of movie), but I understand they get lucid at least once and fight Freddy Krueger knowing it’s a dream.
Stay (2005) – I’ll leave it to each viewer to interpret what this movie is about exactly. (I could write a lot about that.) But I think most will agree that it has at least a connection to lucid dreaming.
If you list eXistenZ, maybe you should also list all virtual reality movies from the 90s, and maybe Avatar (2010) and a lot more with the same sort of connection to lucid dreaming.
If you want to make the list as complete as possible, I’ll look up some more. There are many lists of LD movies on the internet. But they are all so short. I would merge them all into one if I knew a good place to publish it. (I wonder why there is no actively maintained English LD wiki anywhere.) The German LD wiki has a good list. It’s just lacking some movie descriptions. http://www.klartraum-wiki.de/wiki/Filme
Also, there are a lot of single episodes of TV series with at least references to lucid dreaming. Do you want to include them, too? I could list a lot of these if you want.
Thanks for the suggestions!
Nightmare on Elm street was already on there, but the rest I missed. Alice in wonderland is a great one. The other 2 I have not seen.
As for VR, eXistenZ I included because of the false awakening type of stuff that goes on there, but you are right, it’s a problematic inclusion as a category as you’d have to include all of them. What do you think, should those be included?
I guess what we consider VR is technologically created VR and lucid dreaming is perhaps a naturally occurring VR. At the end of the day, both are Virtual Realities, but we are talking about lucid dreaming here… Hmmm.
Lucid Dreaming episodes would be an excellent addition.
Thanks!
I to find a FB page where people talk about a Japanese lucid dreaming film, since my own writings often deal with it and various paranormal experiences by on my own. I’ve just released my new paranormal novel, REading the Signs: A Parnormal Love Story in both paperback and Kindle. thomasrameywatson.com
Have a look at The Company of Wolves
Check out Apitchapong’s work. Specially the movie Cemetery of Splendour