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Deadly Dreams

  • 1988
  • R
  • 1h 19m
IMDb RATING
4.8/10
562
YOUR RATING
Deadly Dreams (1988)
Slasher HorrorHorrorThriller

From the director of the highly acclaimed "Body Chemistry," comes a frightening excursion into terror. Alex is caught in a web of distrust between his brother, his best friend, a beautiful s... Read allFrom the director of the highly acclaimed "Body Chemistry," comes a frightening excursion into terror. Alex is caught in a web of distrust between his brother, his best friend, a beautiful stranger and the renewed dreams of the slaughter of his family.From the director of the highly acclaimed "Body Chemistry," comes a frightening excursion into terror. Alex is caught in a web of distrust between his brother, his best friend, a beautiful stranger and the renewed dreams of the slaughter of his family.

  • Director
    • Kristine Peterson
  • Writer
    • Thom Babbes
  • Stars
    • Mitchell Anderson
    • Juliette Cummins
    • Xander Berkeley
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • IMDb RATING
    4.8/10
    562
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Kristine Peterson
    • Writer
      • Thom Babbes
    • Stars
      • Mitchell Anderson
      • Juliette Cummins
      • Xander Berkeley
    • 18User reviews
    • 16Critic reviews
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • Photos12

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    Top cast19

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    Mitchell Anderson
    Mitchell Anderson
    • Alex Torme
    Juliette Cummins
    Juliette Cummins
    • Maggie Kallir
    Xander Berkeley
    Xander Berkeley
    • Jack Torme
    Thom Babbes
    Thom Babbes
    • Danny
    Timothy Austin
    • Young Alex
    Geoffrey Forward
    • Mr. Torme
    Gyl Roland
    • Mrs. Torme
    Duane Whitaker
    Duane Whitaker
    • Mr. Perkins
    Gray Ainsworth
    • The Hunter
    Troy Evans
    Troy Evans
    • Sheriff
    Stacey Travis
    Stacey Travis
    • Librarian
    Lynn Philip Seibel
    • Coroner
    • (as Lynn Seibel)
    Michael Leopard
    • Sportsman #1
    Beach Dickerson
    Beach Dickerson
    • Sportsman #2
    Al Guarino
    • Bartender
    Jaime Kaplan
    • Boy with toy gun
    Brent DeHart
    • Hotel Clerk
    Phillipe Simon
    • Science Major
    • Director
      • Kristine Peterson
    • Writer
      • Thom Babbes
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    User reviews18

    4.8562
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    Featured reviews

    5CMRKeyboadist

    Old, Predictable Formula

    I remember the first time ever noticing Deadly Dreams. I was working in a Video Warehouse years ago and noticed the cover. Something about it caught my eye. It wasn't until years later that I would come to sit down and actually watch this movie.

    Deadly Dreams plays off like an episode of Tales From the Crypt. It just runs 35 minutes too long. The storyline starts out with a family on Christmas Eve. Two parents and their son Alex wait for the oldest son to come to the house. When they receive a knock on the door, it isn't the oldest son but a man with a rifle who guns down the two parents. 10 years later Alex is 20 years old and often has horrible nightmares of the man who killed his parents murdering him. Alex and his brother both gained a hefty inheritance from the death of their Father and it looks like someone might be trying to get their hands on it.

    For a movie that runs 79 minutes it certainly is very slow. We don't get anything new out of the storyline as Tales From the Crypt did have a story very similar to this one in one of the old comic books. At least the acting was decent in this film and the last ten minutes are interesting. Other then that, I was falling asleep at times.

    This movie might be good for one viewing on a boring Sunday afternoon. Other than that, I would rather watch something else. 5/10
    brandonsites1981

    * * out of 4.

    Young man who lost almost his entire family in a hunting trip several years ago by a serial killer is haunted by visions of the killer and then eventually reality and dreams cross over as he begins to see the killer in real life even though his brother assures him that there is no way that the killer is after him. Brief film with a wicked twist of an ending and a few chilling scenes, features lack luster direction and performances. This film could have been so much more given the premise.

    Rated R; Nudity, Violence, Sexual Situations, and Profanity.
    5sol-kay

    Alex are you taking drugs?

    ***SPOILERS*** The movie "Deadly Dreams" starts off with a Christmas Eve massacre of Mr. & Mrs. Torme, Geoffery Forward & Gyl Roland, with their terrified ten year-old son Alex, Timothy Austin, running for his life outside the cabin into the woods from the masked killer. The killer turns out to be Norman Perkins, Gary Ainsworth, a disgruntled business partner of Mr. Torme who later turned the gun on himself. Waking up in a cold sweat Alex, Mitchell Anderson, now ten years later still has nightmares about that horrible incident.

    "Deadly Dreams" does hold together at first until you realize that after a while you, as well as Alex, can't tell whats a dream and whats reality! That take away a lot from the tension and suspense of the movie.

    The wolf-masked killer is seen popping up all over the place with really no real explanation why he's there and why have him put on that ridicules mask! Since were told who he is in the first place? Later we meet Alex's older brother Jack, Xander Berkeley, who seems to be mad at him for not tending to the family business which his parents left him. You wonder why did they leave it to the much younger Alex, who was ten at the time of his parents death, and not his older brother Jack who seemed to be much more competent. On top of all that Alex didn't seem to care if Jack was in charge so why the conflict between the two brothers?

    Alex is attending college and does some free lance writing on the side and, with the exception of his nightmares, seems happy with his lot in life. Danny, Tom Babbes, a collage friend of Alex gets him to meet pretty and at the same time mysterious Maggie Kallir, Juliette Cummins, on a dare who we later see is having an affair with Jack. Together their both trying to drive poor Alex insane in order to get his share of the inheritance that was left to him from his parents. There's an even more sinister force involved in the story that doesn't reveal itself until the very last minute or so of the movie.

    "Deadly dreams" could have been a really great horror movie but it was so hooked up in it's many dream sequences that they just about wrecked the entire film. The plot holes, mostly due to the dream sequences, were as deep and as many as a mine field in the Western Sahara Desert during the Battle of Al Alamine. Watching the movie I wondered what a top horror film director of the 1980's like Fred Walton or Sam Raimi would have done with the same movie? The improvement in the movies story-line would have been quite noticeable and made more sense.

    The material in the film "Deadly Dreams" was far better then most stories that were made into horror/suspense films back then and the movie should have been far better then it ended up being. If only all those confusing and annoying dream-sequences were cut out of it.
    Backlash007

    Snooze.

    Deadly Dreams has mastered the art of...boring someone to death! The title says it all: dreams. The entire first hour of the film is nothing but a series of bad dreams. Over and over again. It really gets monotonous; Nothing real ever happens. The characters are dumb, most of the action that did take place just seemed to be filler stuff, and apparently everyone carries a rifle with them at all times. Not to mention that it's all totally PREDICTABLE. The entire time I was watching it, I just wanted it to end. Don't expect too much going into this one. As a matter of fact, don't even bother.
    5Coventry

    Love the mask, Mr... Norman Perkins?

    Every remotely experienced horror fanatic becomes skeptical when the words "dreams" or "nightmare" feature in the title of a cheap & obscure late-80s slasher. Back then, every aspiring director wanted to cash in on the success of Wes Craven's "A Nightmare on Elm Street" and do 'something' with dreams/nightmares.

    Kristine Peterson's "Deadly Dream" seemingly fits this description, but it honestly deserves a bit more praise and credit. This certainly isn't a hidden treasure or an undiscovered gem, but it does have a couple of worthwhile moments. The opening sequence, for instance, is quite heave and depicts the brutal murder or a mother and father - on Christmas day - by a hunter with a vicious animal skin mask, who goes by the name of Norman Perkins.

    Norman Perkins! Get it? I was eagerly awaiting the arrival of another character named Anthony Bates, but he never showed up. Anyway, the murders are bloody and brutal, and little Alex who witnessed the massacre of mom and dad still struggles with mental issues more than a decade later. Alex has dreams and visions of Norman Perkins stalking him with his eerie mask. Then, inevitable, follows the clichéd and derivative middle section. Is Perkins really chasing Alex, or is he only dreaming it? Or maybe he's being pranked by his idiot best friend or driven loco by someone else entirely?

    The middle section is quite dull, but the overall running time is luckily quite short, and there are still noteworthy moments, like the gratuitous nudity provided by Juliette Cummings and the many appearances of that really cool skin-mask! The climax also still holds a few neat (albeit predictable) twists in store. Overall, worth your time if you're an 80s horror fanatic.

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    Related interests

    Roger Jackson in Scream (1996)
    Slasher Horror
    Mia Farrow in Rosemary's Baby (1968)
    Horror
    Cho Yeo-jeong in Parasite (2019)
    Thriller

    Storyline

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    Did you know

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    • Trivia
      This film was shot in eighteen days around Christmas time.
    • Connections
      Referenced in You're Next (2011)

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    FAQ15

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    Details

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    • Release date
      • October 26, 1988 (United States)
    • Country of origin
      • United States
    • Language
      • English
    • Also known as
      • Träume des Wahnsinns
    • Filming locations
      • Santa Monica, California, USA(main location)
    • Production companies
      • Concorde Pictures
      • Pacific Trust
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

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    • Budget
      • $400,000 (estimated)
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Tech specs

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    • Runtime
      • 1h 19m(79 min)
    • Color
      • Color
    • Sound mix
      • Mono
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.85 : 1

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