Come True is a 2020 movie analyzing that strange world lurking in our minds, waiting every time we close our eyes to fall asleep.
The main character is young Sarah, a girl who struggles every night with the chronic insomnia that plagues her.
In fact, she dreads sleeping because she suffers from terrible nightmares in which she ends up in a strange dark world with a persistent threat waiting for her in the dark.
Tired and desperate, she decides to participate in a sleep study conducted by a mysterious scientific organization, hoping it will offer a solution to her problems.
The research lab, an aseptic and impersonal facility, becomes Sarah’s new resting place, where they observe and monitor her and other volunteers as they sleep.
She also develops a close relationship with Jeremy, one of the students, who later reveals that their dreams are visualized and recorded by advanced technology that is still experimental.
As the nights progress, Sarah realizes the nightmares appear to be linking not just to her, but also to the other people participating in the study.
The frightening images she sees as she sleeps, become more and more vivid, blurring the lines between reality and dreams.
Analyzing the recordings, Jeremy is increasingly uneasy about the dark figure who now seems free from the girl’s mind, even appearing in his dreams.
Soon it becomes clear that not only their sanity is in danger but also their lives when Sarah ends up in the hospital after yet another nightmare she could not wake up from.
However, there is something behind this that could frighteningly explain what is happening, even if they have to question the foundations of the same reality.
Other worlds that don’t exist but we all know about
Not everyone, unfortunately, is aware of small productions like this 2020 movie, but Come True is an experience you have to feel before you will judge.
While the dreamlike topic has been exploited many times in the cinematic landscape, such as in the famous Nightmare sagas or Christopher Nolan‘s celebrated Inception, this detailed exploration of the subconscious stands out for its singularity.
In just under an hour and three-quarters, it becomes a new perspective on the dream realm with the darkness and mysterious presences that haunt the protagonist’s psyche claiming unexplored narrative territory.
Against this background, the central figure’s rich and intricate mental labyrinths are boldly and brilliantly revealed. We begin our journey into the shadows, captured by the rolling camera lensing us into a sequence where the cinematic perspective plunges into a maze of unforgettable dreams and visions.
The superbly elegant visionary depictions turn out to be exquisite pearls of imaginative visual artwork, where our guide through this surreal universe is Julia Sarah Stone, whose simple and charming performance turns out to be a familiar face, similar to a coworker or classmate.
Unlike other movies depending upon the aura of a celebrity, this peculiar production shines through its distinctive qualities and particular insight.
Although the narrative may seem incomplete or lacking, come the end, the experience leaves the viewer in a state of amazed disbelief.
Indeed, I did not particularly enjoy the final touches with a concluding twist that explains, in its own way, something that perhaps did not need to be defined and perfectly lived on those emotional chords that director Anthony Scott Burns touches, one after another, in just the proper sequence of fascination and disquiet.
A Dance of Shadows and Sounds
Anthony Scott Burns demonstrates total control of the cinematic experience, serving as director, cinematographer, and also screenwriter along with Daniel Weissenberger.
This multifaceted expertise contributes to a unique and integrative artistic outlook, bringing the movie into a coherent perspective with a unique style suspended between fantasy, horror and sci-fi.
The castle of this realm becomes the sleep research center, where we immediately immerse into it with a convincing authenticity, despite its futuristic technologies, such as the equipment transferring dreams to a screen.
The doctor, Christopher Heatherington, offers a detailed and credible introduction with his clear expositions on the various stages of sleep and their effect on our bodies and minds during the disturbing appearance of the faceless creature on the screen.
Equally good is the solid performance of Landon Liboiron as assistant Jeremy, although the relationship with the protagonist could benefit from more delineation of this character’s background.
This does not affect the genuine emotions during the romance scenes, although it remains obscure why Jeremy goes rogue and keeps his boss in the dark about the girl’s serious problems.
As I said, I was not too fond of the final explanation. However, it doesn’t distort the logical sense of the story we are witnessing, and here I’ll stop to not go further and spoil the surprise.
Finally, I want to mention the music tracks by Electric Youth and Pilotpriest, which perfectly accompany the different stages of the movie as an essential element between the beautifully haunting tones during the dream scenes and the evocative 1980s synth melodies.
Music that is close to the rhythms that John Carpenter composed for his famous movies such as Halloween or The Thing, from which Come True draws, carries the style and spirit (though perhaps not wholly the essence) to the distant 2020.
Still, let us celebrate this flawed and incomplete, but undoubtedly seductive and intriguing ordeal in a way so different from many other sci-fi horror movies, in a winning mix to watch over and over again and discover the many details hidden in each and every shot.
