‘Dream a Little Dream’ Blu-ray Review (Vestron Video)

Stars: Corey Feldman, Corey Haim, Meredith Salenger, Jason Robards, Piper Laurie, William McNamara, Harry Dean Stanton, Matt Adler, Alex Rocco, Victoria Jackson | Written by Daniel Jay Franklin, Marc Rocco, Danny Eisenberg | Directed by Marc Rocco

For those that haven’t seen the film, Dream a Little Dream tells the story of Bobby (Feldman) who, after some spiritual shenanigans and yoga in the garden, swaps bodies with Jason Robards’ Coleman Ettinger. And Coleman’s wife (played by Piper Laurie) swaps bodies, sort of, with Bobby’s high school crush Lainie (Meredith Salenger). And like all good body swap films, Coleman must find a way to swap back tie Bobby by helping him get the girl… If he can survive high school and the aggressive, dangerous behaviour of Lainie’s boyfriend Joel (William McNamara).

Yes this is essentially a body-swap comedy but Dream a Little Dream is a lot more than that, it’s a musical, it’s a coming of age film, it’s a discussion on life and the pursuit of happiness and a diatribe on the generational gap and how each of us can learn from each other. All wrapped up in the popularity of the two Corey’s, Haim and Feldman – who were like cinematic goldust at the time following films like The Lost Boys and License to Drive. Dream a Little Dream was also – for those unaware – beset by problems, mainly the fact Corey Haim broke his leg before production and the script had to accommodate that. Plus Marc Rocco was apparently as wild as his main characters Bobby and Dinger (Corey Haim); and how the film’s script – according to Corey Feldman – was, for him, more of a character study, an intellectual take on spiritualism rather than a teen movie, that originally ran a whopping 3 or 4 HOURS. Yes, hours, and was cut down to a mere 114 minutes!

No matter, Dream a Little Dream is without a doubt my favourite film of all time – I have a tattoo of the film’s title on my arm, I rented the film (at £1 a week) from my local video store so much, no stop for about 6 months if I remember rightly, that the store owner made me my own copy of the film – which I still have to this day; complete with a custom-made cover I made waaaay back in 1996 when I started my Media Studies degree. So having seen Dream a Little Dream over 200 times (I kid you not AND that’s after I’ve stopped counting) the real interest in this new Blu-ray release was the special features. After all, as a MASSIVE fan of the film I had read everything there was to know about the film and seen (and read) tons of interviews about the film – so would these new special features tell me anything new? Would there be a nugget of information that I didn’t already know? I was eager to find out.

When Lightning Strikes is an interview with producer Lawrence Kasanoff, who discusses how he got into producing movies with Lightning Pictures and how the company essentially wanted to let filmmakers loose to produce out-there movies… hence we got Dream a Little Dream. In this feature, Kasanoff talks about Dream a Little Dream was all Marc Rocco, whose genius and eccentricity made the film what it was – including getting the cast he wanted and changing the ending from its original “logical” ending (which I fully support given that the existing ending is thoroughly brilliant). Unfortunately, this feature focuses more on how Dream a Little Dream was part of the Lightning Pictures/Vestron Video production slate rather than hyper-focussing on the film itself.

The second feature, Young at Heart, is a 30-minute interview with Corey Feldman who discusses how he came on board the film, how Marc Rocco made this film for him to be the lead (a lot of the two Corey’s films were led by Haim) but insisting he had to play himself AND perfect the mannerisms and behaviour of Jason Robards in order to make the film work. It’s actually the first modern Corey Feldman interview in which he seems to be speaking from the heart – the falsity of his persona that you see and read online is stripped away and it all feels a lot more real. Thankfully. And he actually talks about the fact that Corey Haim was NOT the original choice for Dinger – something that is never usually talked about when discussing Dream a Little Dream! Feldman also talks about Meredith Salenger and how the duo’s relationship, given that she was not the first choice for Lainie, made the film better.

Unfortunately, Salenger’s non-inclusion on this release is a real shame – I would have loved to have seen her talk about the film and her experience etc., no matter how blunt it was. In fact, There are a number of cast members who could’ve shot a few brief quotes – like William McNamara, whose role was as important to the film’s story as many others IMHO.

The interview with Feldman is easily the better of the two on this disc, with Feldman really talking at length and in-depth (to an extent) and revealing – probably the biggest reveal of the feature – that Rocco wanted to make a Director’s Cut of the film prior to his death, something I’m sure Feldman and Rocco’s widow could EASILY crowdfund for, given the films now-popularity. I say that because it sure wasn’t popular at the time and, until the very recent surge in interest in the film on YouTube, still to this day is as well known as Feldman’s other films at the time.

Unfortunately, the audio commentary from film historian Jarrat Gahah is far too droll. Gahan feels like he’s reading from a number of bullet points, talking fact after fact, and there’s no excitement to his voice and he, sadly, sounds uninterested in the film. Hey, at least he touches on a LOT of key facts and points that fans of the film know – and thus, filling in those that have gone into the film blind. I say that as, just looking on social media, many are going into Dream a Little Dream as part of the Vestron line rather than being pre-existing fans!

I’ve decided to review the Vestron Video disc on two counts – the film and the disc itself. Mainly because there’s no way I could ever give Dream a Little Dream less than a maximum of five stars and the disc, despite the efforts put into it, is sadly missing a number of extras that could have made the disc as stellar as the movie (in fact I myself have probably got enough press material from across the globe that could’ve made a decent image gallery for example). Hell, even making the cover reversible would have gone a long way to improve this release!

Of course, the picture quality makes up for a lot of the disc’s score, this Blu-ray release easily makes the film look better than it has, at least on physical media (I say that as the film has been available in a HD digital version for some time now), for years!

Film: ***** 5/5
Disc: ***½ 3.5/5

The Vestron Collectors Series release of Dream a Little Dream is out now in the US, no word on whether this will be ported across to the UK version of the Vestron line (if it is I’ll certainly buy it again!)