May 22, 2009

Episode 6: The Endless Dream of Morpheus


Of course it was going to happen at some point: an episode devoted to dreams and The Sandman. For this occasion, we invited director Sasa Stanisic as a guest to give us a picture of why this series of graphic novels is so successful not just as entertainment but as an art work with a multitude of layers within layers. His answer in summary, it's because of how well the author Neil Gaiman establishes the novel's world where ancient myths and popular culture intersect. Our answer is a bit less constructed: it's because Morpheus looks a lot like Robert Smith from the Cure (even though he really copies the physical appearance of the author himself). Plus, it doesn't hurt that the stories are so touchy: take one element out of each Sandman tale, and it all falls apart into a stream of piled up emotions... which, of course, adds to the drama of narration.

We also discussed some aspects of dreaming as well as the horror of waking up into infinity, a concept that gives fuel to one of the scariest non-horror films of the last 10 years, Richard Linklater's Waking Life. Freddy Krueger was also mentioned briefly, and of course, mostly in the context of the blood geyser sequence everyone is talking about...



Now the playlist for The Endless Dream... As you will notice, the song selection for this episode is divided in two radically different halves, the first devoted to "totally uncool" golden oldies that are not only quoted in Neil Gaiman's masterpiece, but also happen to be among my favorite single songs of all time; and the second soaking in a much darker sound full of "hits" such as Einsturzende Neubauten's "Armenia." More importantly, starting from this episode the show is fully recorded and available for your listening experience by clicking HERE...


Finally, it would be a terrible shame to omit the classic homage to the Candy Colored Clown: Dean Stockwell and Dennis Hopper in Blue Velvet! Sweet dreams...



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