Mark Kermode, Observer film critic 

The Nightmare review – snoozy investigation of sleep paralysis

Cheesy scares trump analysis in Rodney Ascher’s hokey docu-horror
  
  

The Nightmare
‘Boringly similar dreams’: The Nightmare. Photograph: PR

Watching this overegged hybrid docu-horror investigation of sleep paralysis, I found myself fighting the urge to snooze. Hokey dramatisations accompany a dreary roundelay of talking heads recounting boringly similar dreams of shadow men and shifty aliens, interspersed with clumsily chosen clips from A Nightmare on Elm Street and the alien abduction stinker Communion.

Having playfully picked apart Kubrick’s The Shining in Room 237, director Rodney Ascher here flounders around trying to get a grip on his subject, eschewing insightful analyses for cheesy scares. His subjects are variously distressed by their experiences, but the film signally fails to welcome us to their collective nightmares.

The Nightmare trailer.
 

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