Beautiful Dreamers

Jun 5, 1990

1h 45m

★ 5.2

The World Changes Some People. Some People Change The World.

Overview

When the superintendent of the Canadian insane asylum, Dr. Maurice Bucke, meets poet Walt Whitman, his life and that of his wife and patients is radically changed. Like Dr. Bucke, Whitman has avant-garde ideas on the subject of mental illness. "Dreamers" is based on true events. Dr. Bucke became an important biographer of Walt Whitman.

Genres

Drama

Production Companies

ONF | NFB

Beautiful Dreamers Trailers

No Trailers found.

Cast

Dr. Maurice Bucke

Colm Feore

Walt Whitman

Rip Torn

Jessie Bucke

Wendel Meldrum

Molly Jessop

Sheila McCarthy

Rev. Haines

Colin Fox

Dr. Lett

David Gardner

Leonard Thomas

Tom McCamus

Dr. John Burgys

Albert Schultz

Henderson

J. Winston Carroll

Agatha Haines

Barbara Gordon

Birdie Bucke

Marsha Moreau

Timothy Pardee

Roland Hewgill

Francis, a young man, recalls in his memory the horrible experiences he and his fiancée Jane recently went through. Francis and his friend Alan visit The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, an exhibit where the mysterious doctor shows the somnambulist Cesare, and awakens him for some moments from his death-like sleep.

5.0

Le Divorce

Aug 8, 2003

While visiting her sister in Paris, a young woman finds romance and learns her brother-in-law is a philanderer.

6.8

The Tiger and the Snow

Oct 14, 2005

Love and injury in time of war. Attilio de Giovanni teaches poetry in Italy. He has a romantic soul, and women love him. But he is in love with Vittoria, and the love is unrequited. Every night he dreams of marrying her, in his boxer shorts and t-shirt, as Tom Waits sings. Vittoria travels to Iraq with her friend, Fuad, a poet; they are there with the second Gulf War breaks out. Vittoria is injured. Attilio must get to her side, and then, as war rages around him, he must find her the medical care she needs. In war, does love conquer all?

6.4

Haunting of Mount Gede

Feb 6, 2025

A hike on Mount Gede during school break turns terrifying for two friends when one defies a local superstition — and a vengeful spirit takes hold of her.

4.7

The Young Schiller

Apr 29, 2005

The young Friedrich Schiller begins his life as a poet with a dramatic escape. After the sensational success of his first drama "The Robbers", he deserts from the Duke's army. At the Mannheim Court and National Theatre, he initially receives a friendly reception, but his new play "Fiesko" is not well received by the artistic director Dalberg. In the successful actor and author August Wilhelm Iffland, Schiller finds a strong competitor for the position of in-house playwright and vies with him for the love of the same woman. The young poet's situation becomes increasingly precarious; he has no money, suffers from hunger and falls seriously ill. Nevertheless, he works feverishly for recognition and success with no regard for his own health.

6.6

The Prince of Tides

Dec 25, 1991

A troubled Southern man talks to his suicidal sister's psychiatrist about their family history and falls in love with her (and New York City) in the process.

6.4

Amour Fou

May 16, 2014

Heinrich wishes to conquer death through love, and when he meets Henriette, the wife of a business acquaintance, she expresses interest in a suicide pact when she learns she has a terminal illness.

7.5

My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown

Apr 7, 1989

No one expects much from Christy Brown, a boy with cerebral palsy born into a working-class Irish family. Though Christy is a spastic quadriplegic and essentially paralyzed, a miraculous event occurs when, at the age of 5, he demonstrates control of his left foot by using chalk to scrawl a word on the floor. With the help of his steely mother — and no shortage of grit and determination — Christy overcomes his infirmity to become a painter, poet and author.

7.9

The Postman

Apr 7, 1994

Simple Italian postman learns to love poetry while delivering mail to a famous poet; he uses this to woo local beauty Beatrice.

6.8

Barfly

Sep 2, 1987

Downtrodden writer Henry and distressed goddess Wanda aren't exactly husband and wife: they're wedded to their bar stools. But, they like each other's company—and Barfly captures their giddy, gin-soaked attempts to make a go of life on the skids.

6.4

Narcissus and Psyche

Dec 22, 1980

Narcisus and Psyche is based on a novel by Sandor Weores which was adapted by Vilmos Csaplar and director Gabor Body for a feature-length film. Borrowing the character of Psyche from mythology and placing her in Europe in the 19th century, the authors give her a "modern" life. She is an attractive young woman - and remains so throughout the film, in spite of one hardship after another. Psyche is libidinous, and her prurient interests shock her staid contemporaries.

7.5

Moulin Rouge!

May 18, 2001

A celebration of love and creative inspiration takes place in the infamous, gaudy and glamorous Parisian nightclub, at the cusp of the 20th century. A young poet, who is plunged into the heady world of Moulin Rouge, begins a passionate affair with the club's most notorious and beautiful star.

6.3

Love in Thoughts

Feb 12, 2004

A posthumous look at the last days of Guenther's life as he, his best friend, and his sister let loose on a four-day binge of alcohol, drugs, and sex.

6.7

Maya Dardel

Mar 12, 2017

An internationally respected poet announces she is going to kill herself and needs an heir and executor. Young writers drive up the mountain to compete for the position and are challenged intellectually, emotionally, and erotically.

7.5

Forever a Woman

Nov 23, 1955

Fumiko, mother of two children and wife of an unfaithful man, shares her family life with her budding vocation as a poet. The beginning of her successful literary career coincides with her divorce and her breast cancer diagnosis. In the last stage of her life, she meets a young journalist from Tokyo who wants to write a story on her life.

10.0

Santa Maria della Salute

Dec 20, 2016

The film narrates a tormented love story between one of the most famous poets of Serbian literature, Laza Kostic, renowned for his sublime poetic puns and word coining and an enchanting young girl by the name of Lenka Dundjerski, an educated and refined daughter of a landowner Lazar Dundjerski. Standing in the way of their love is the insurmountable age gap between the two, as Kostic is 29 years older than his beloved one. The affair inspired one of the most sophisticated and tender love poems of the time, an utmost expression of yearning, in which the poet's unflinching devotion is linked to his admiration for a Venice basilisk by the name of Santa Maria della Salute.

0.0

More Beautiful Than Death

Sep 2, 2026

And death and life she hated equally, And nothing saw, for her despair, But dreadful time, dreadful eternity, No comfort anywhere

5.9

The Libertine

Sep 16, 2004

The story of John Wilmot, a.k.a. the Earl of Rochester, a 17th century poet who famously drank and debauched his way to an early grave, only to earn posthumous critical acclaim for his life's work.

7.0

An Angel at My Table

Sep 20, 1990

Based on the autobiographical work of New Zealand writer Janet Frame, this production depicts the author at various stage of her life. Afflicted with mental and emotional issues, Frame grows up in an impoverished family and experiences numerous tragedies while still in her youth, including the deaths of two of her siblings. Portrayed as an adult by Kerry Fox, Frame finds acclaim for her writing while still in a mental institution, and her success helps her move on with her life.

4.7

Prometey

Feb 4, 1936

The life was cruel with Ivas. The landlord sent him at war, and his girlfriend – in the house of ill fame. In the troops an ordinary peasant gets acquainted with an ideological revolutionary and becomes inspired with the feeling of inequity to the existing social structure. And when the time comes to return to the native village, he will make the sir pays by his blood for all wrong-doings against the peasants. A film based on works and biography of the Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko (1814 - 1861).