Lucid Dream

Writer-director Jun-sung Kim skillfully creates a fast-paced, dramatic, and at times violent crime thriller. The action in Lucid Dream isn't quite as breakneck as a Jason Bourne movie, but the addition of human interactions and dreamy special effects adds a depth and level of interest above many more mechanical examples of the genre. If the three-year-old kidnap case is cold, why not have the heartbroken father enter his own dreams to look for clues he missed when his boy was snatched? And if that isn't enough, why not find a way to enter the dreams of the kidnappers? The child kidnapping case serves as a reality against which the director can exercise his sci-fi imagination and force characters to face danger in the subconscious worlds of others. The fact that actual lucid dreaming probably wouldn't be any help at all in such a case seems beside the point. The effort to find the perpetrators leads to many plot twists, and promising clues that come to a halt at dead ends and dead people. Our hopes are buoyed then dashed as the story unfolds. Just when you think the hero has found what he's looking for, the lead sours but points him elsewhere.

The genre begs for clichés and they are provided: the police detective is a reliably somber pragmatist, and a crusty old private eye provides comic relief.