Love Beyond Dreams: Rediscovering Old Passions Underneath the Rubble of Chores

Jeremiah Kipp directed and Simin Vaswani written Love Beyond Dreams follows the rare day out of an exhausted woman. Having gone so long without any sources of pleasure or relief in her day-to-day life, the protagonist Simin barely remembers what those look or feel like, until someone brings her to the reminders.

Not coincidentally played by Vaswani, Simin’s face is the first visual that greets the viewer: tired, haggard, and just holding onto reality by a thread. It is the face of someone a snap away from dissociating from her surroundings entirely and wandering into thoughts of how styrofoam is really just the brand name. Anything but the incessant, robotic calls of responsibility: young child, aged mother, the toaster. Even dressing up is a tiresome chore; half her hair is up in curling clips.

But in comes her husband and saviour, Harish (Harish Vaswani) to turn the volume down on everything and take her out for an evening at the museum. Surrounded by art and quiet, Simin can finally relax. Entranced by the liveliness of Renoir’s Dance at Bougival she escapes now into a fantasy world of dance, passion, and romance. Simin becomes Charmaine, meets Antoine (Stefan Badea, sensitive in his limited role), falls in love and finds her happy ending.

More classical than impressionistic, the sequence lasts for thirteen of the twenty-nine minute runtime, executed entirely with music and without dialogue. It tries to recreate something of that heady vivacity of the painting by incorporating a large cast of dancers in a ballroom and it largely works, despite the playlist-y soundtrack. In particular, the dancer in blue leaves an impression as couple after couple move in and out of the viewer’s attention.

To the film’s success, Vaswanis shine together. When the fantasy ends, Harish comes back into focus, and Simin rediscovers their old attraction. The dizzying revolving shot is accompanied by the final lines of the poetic voiceover narration that has marked the film’s romantic moments. After its flight into fancy, Love Beyond Dreams ends on a terribly domestic note: the couple and their child at home. Happy.

Watch Love Beyond Dreams Short Film Trailer