The Nightmare

Pretty immersive, good look into the people's head. Not really trying to convince or explain anything, just wonder. Not quite a documentary, not quite a horror movie. Fear comes from the creepy atmosphere and interesting stories.

The Nightmare is a genuinely scary look into the real life experiences of people suffering with sleep paralysis. It's fascinating to hear first hand what it is that the victims are experiencing, particularly when you see how their stories overlap with shared or similar visions. The reconstructions that play also draw you into the experience yourself, so it almost plays out more like a horror film than a documentary.

Therein lies my biggest gripe about this film, it's not really an examination of the phenomenon, just a retelling of a group of peoples night terrors. At no point is there a medical or scientific point of view on the subject; all the "evidence" presented is anecdotal. Not only this, the editing almost tries to lean toward a spiritual viewpoint, which is disappointing as instead of getting to learn about this condition it tends to feel more like a religious propaganda piece, going so far as to claim that the only defence against this particular nightmare is the word "jesus".

Entertaining, but not overly useful if your hoping to learn something.

This (horror-)documentary is about sleep paralysis, a phenomenon in which a person either during falling asleep or awakening, temporarily experiences an inability to move, speak, or react. A transitional state between wakefulness and sleep, characterized by muscle weakness, often accompanied by terrifying hallucinations and physical experiences. It's been a recognized part of human experience for centuries, but sleep scientists are only just beginning to understand the condition.

'Room 237' director Rodney Ascher's documentary largely eschews hard science to focus on the emotional and psychological toll. He interviews eight sufferers whose lives have been upended by repeated bouts of nocturnal panic and vivid, inescapable hallucinations.

'The Nightmare' wants to be the first properly scary documentary, employing time-honored horror movie techniques in a concerted effort to spook the viewer. But it's here that Ascher slightly oversteps himself. While there is a well-maintained sense of lurking discomfort, the gotcha scenes feel a little cheap. In the end, a straight doc might have been more rewarding, but it entertained nevertheless.

this is a documentary about sleep paralysis, not an educational film on the medical science and history of the phenomenon, but a series of narratives by people who have experienced it firsthand and their interpretations of their experiences

the documentary is intended to scare, with an accompaniment to the interviews and short re-enactments of primarily minimalist, suspenseful synth and droning/pulsating percussive noise by composer Jonathan Snipes. the interviewees are all fairly articulate, the film is well-edited and the monster/(dream) entity designs and costumes for the re-enactments are artfully haunting

the film is very effective at what it sets out to do, namely exploring a phenomena people throughout the world, including the director, have experienced and its effects on their beliefs and personalities it inspires a large enough fraction of the fear and contemplation in the viewer that the phenomena itself must inspire in those who experience it firsthand to make it well worth watching and recommending

The directing and editing on this documentary are very well done. Lots of really great horror imagery. I'm not sure if it's the people embellishing their stories or if the interviews are just scripted to begin with. But something feels incredibly fake about a lot of it. I really hate giving this a bad score. I was going to give a lower one but at least a 5 is average. Its a very well made movie, but some of the stories people were telling made me cringe with how made up they felt. Who knows, though. Maybe they did experience that. But for one reason or another, I didn't buy it. If you're interested in the topic of sleep paralysis, this is a decent watch. Check it out on Netflix. You might like it more than I did.