Dreams

The film does not have one narrative, but is episodic in nature, following the adventures of a "surrogate Kurosawa" through eight different segments, or "dreams", each one titled. A young boy's mother tells him to stay at home during a day when the sun is shining through the rain, warning him that foxes have their weddings during such weather, and do not like to be seen. He defies her wishes, wandering into a forest where he witnesses the slow wedding procession of the foxes. He is spotted by them and runs home. His mother meets him at the front door, barring the way, and says that an angry fox came by the house, leaving behind a tantō knife. The mother gives the knife to the boy and tells him that he must go and beg forgiveness from the foxes, refusing to let him return home unless he does so. She warns that if he does not secure their forgiveness, he must take his own life. Taking the knife, the boy sets off into the mountains, towards the place under the rainbow where the foxes' home is said to be. In spring, on the day of Hinamatsuri (the Doll Festival), a boy spots a small girl dressed in pink in his house. He follows her outside to where his family's peach orchard once was. Living versions of the hina dolls appear before him on the orchard's slopes, and reveal themselves to be the spirits of the peach trees. Because the boy's family chopped down the trees of the orchard, the dolls berate him. However, after realizing that the boy loved the blossoms and did not want the trees to be felled, they agree to give him one last look at the orchard as it once was. They perform a dance to Etenraku that causes the blossoming trees to reappear. The boy sees the mysterious girl walking among the blooming trees and runs after her, but she and the trees suddenly vanish. He walks sadly through the thicket of stumps where the trees had been, until he sees a single young peach tree, in full bloom, sprouting where she stood. A group of four mountaineers struggle up a mountain path during a horrendous blizzard. It has been snowing for three days and the men are dispirited and ready to give up. One by one they stop walking, giving in to the snow and sure death. The leader endeavors to push on, but he too, stops in the snow. A strange woman (the yuki-onna of Japanese folklore) appears out of nowhere and attempts to lure the last conscious man into giving in to his death. He resists, shaking off his stupor and her entreaties, to discover that the storm has abated, and that their camp is only a few meters away. A discharged Japanese company commander is walking down a deserted road at dusk, on his way back home from fighting in the Second World War. He comes to a large concrete pedestrian tunnel, from which a barking and snarling anti-tank dog emerges. The commander walks through the dark tunnel and comes out on the other side. He is followed by the ghost of one of his soldiers, Private Noguchi, who had died of severe wounds in the commander's arms. Noguchi's face appears blue with blackened eyes. Noguchi seems not to believe that he is dead. Noguchi points to a light emanating from a house on a nearby mountainside, which he identifies as his parents' home. He is heartbroken, knowing he cannot see them again, even while he remains respectful to the commander. Following the commander's wish that he accept his fate, Noguchi returns into the tunnel. The commander's entire third platoon, led by a young lieutenant brandishing an officer's sword, then marches out of the tunnel. They come to a halt and present arms, saluting the commander. Their faces too are colored blue. The commander struggles to tell them that they are dead, having all been killed in combat, and that he himself is to blame for sending them into a futile battle. They stand mute in reply. The commander orders them to turn about face, and salutes them in a farewell as they march back into the tunnel. Collapsing in grief, the commander is quickly brought back to his feet by the reappearance of the anti-tank dog. An art student finds himself inside the world of Vincent van Gogh's artwork, where he meets the artist in a field and converses with him. Van Gogh relates that his left ear gave him problems during a self-portrait, so he cut it off. The student loses track of the artist, and travels through a number of Van Gogh's works trying to find him, concluding with Van Gogh's Wheat Field with Crows. A large nuclear power plant near Mount Fuji has begun to melt down. The sky is filled with red fumes and millions of Japanese citizens flee in terror towards the ocean. Eventually, two men, a woman, and her two small children are seen alone at the edge of the sea. The older man, who is dressed in a business suit, explains to the younger man that the rest of the people have drowned themselves in the ocean. He then says that the different colors of the clouds billowing across the rubbish-strewn landscape signify different radioactive isotopes. According to him, red indicates plutonium-239, which can cause cancer; yellow indicates strontium-90, which causes leukemia; and purple indicates cesium-137, which causes birth defects. He then remarks about the foolish futility of color-coding such dangerous gases. The woman, hearing these descriptions, recoils in horror before angrily cursing those responsible and the pre-disaster assurances of safety they had made. The suited man displays contrition, suggesting that he is in part responsible for the disaster. The other man, dressed casually, watches the multicolored radioactive clouds advance upon them. When he turns back towards the others at the shore, he sees the woman weeping: the suit-clad man has leaped to his death. A cloud of red dust reaches them, causing the mother to shrink back in terror. The remaining man attempts to shield the mother and her children by using his jacket to feebly fan away the radioactive billows. A man finds himself wandering around a misty, bleak mountainous terrain. He meets an oni-like being, who is actually a mutated human with a single horn on his head. The "demon" explains that there had been a nuclear holocaust which resulted in the loss of plants and animals, and in the aftermath the land is populated by towering dandelions taller than humans, deformed animals, and people sprouting horns. He elaborates that, by dusk, the horns cause them to feel excruciating pain; however, they cannot die, so they simply howl in agony during the night. Many of the "demons" were former millionaires and government officials, who are now suffering through a hell befitting for their sins. The "demon" warns the man to flee, when the man asks where he should go to, the "demon" asks if he too wants to become a demon. The horrified man then runs away from the scene with the "demon" in pursuit. A man enters a peaceful village amid flowing streams, where he sees children laying flowers on a large stone. He meets a wise old man who is fixing a broken water mill wheel. The elder informs the younger man that residents of the village simply refer to it as "the village", and that outsiders call it "the village of the water mills". When the younger man inquires about the lack of electricity in the village, the elder explains that the people of his village decided long ago to forsake modern technology, and laments the notion of modern convenience and the pollution of nature. The younger man asks the elder about the stone which children were placing flowers on. The elder tells him that, long ago, an ailing traveler died on that spot. The villagers buried him there and placed the rock there as a headstone. Ever since, it has become customary in the village to offer flowers there. The younger man and the elder hear the sounds of a funeral procession for an old woman nearby. Rather than mourning her death, the people in the procession celebrate joyfully the peaceful end of her long life. The elder goes to join the procession, and the younger man leaves flowers on the stone before departing the village.

Plot from Dreams (1990 film)CC BY-SA 4.0