Shatara Michelle Ford’s Dreams in Nightmares made its world premiere nearly two years ago, at the BlackStar Film Festival in Philadelphia. Reviews coming out of the screening were strong; Ford had clearly built on the success of their celebrated debut, Test Pattern, which was nominated for the Gotham Award for Best Feature and three Indie Spirits. The cast featured such recognizable names as Denée Benton (The Gilded Age), Jasmin Savoy Brown (Yellowjackets) and Charlie Barnett (Russian Doll), to say nothing of its superb breakout performances. It felt like nothing else out there.
Yet getting Dreams in Nightmares into theaters two years later, via the nascent small distributor Lunette Films, was no easy task. “I had made my own kind of peace with, ‘Okay, this was one of those experiences where the art already fed me creatively, and maybe we won’t get to have the visibility return of what it means for it to be really seen in a widespread way,’” says Benton, who gives a bracing performance in the lead role. “I didn’t think we were going to get to have this moment.”
Denée Benton in Dreams in Nightmares.
The moment, fortunately, is here, with the release set for Aug. 21. Ford acknowledges it has been a difficult path. But the filmmaker sees it as somewhat inevitable for making the kinds of movies they make — singular, uncompromising and utterly independent. “Anytime you’re doing something slightly unconventional, anytime you’re engaging with stuff from a less established vantage point, the routes that you have to take to come back into the masses, if you will, are always going to be windy and arduous — and that’s okay,” they say. “Doing new things or unusual things is hard.”
