The Lathe of Heaven

Yes.

<i>No!</i>

Hey, George! Not a bad day?

Better than most. - Going around to your therapy?

Yeh, I'm gonna see an Óneirologist. - An o what neirologist?

Can I see?

What'll they think up next?

Excuse me, do you know where Willamette East Tower is?

Dr. Haber.

First floor, second elevator, please.

Hold it!

Hello! - Yes?

I have an appointment with Dr. Haber.

Name, please. - George Orr.

Dr. Haber's expecting you. It's the last office on your right.

You can hang your raincoat over there.

Thank you.

Doctor, see overdose.

Yes?

Dr. Haber? - Oh! Mr. Orr!

It's a pleasure to meet you. Come in.

Would you have a sit?

Do you smoke? The brown filters are tranks, the white are denicks.

Oh, no, thank you. I don't smoke.

Good. It's tough enough in here already.

Damn electric heating system on a freeze again, I'm afraid.

Well, it's ok!

Don't be nervous, Mr. Orr.

Your punishment is no worse than a few sessions with me.

That's better. Do you have your VT card?

Oh. Yes, here.

So, mixing Phenobarbital and Dexedrine?

Quite a dangerous concoction, won't you say?

Mr. Orr?

You have a dream problem, don't you?

How did you know? - No great wit,

I'm an oneirologist, Mr. Orr, a dream specialist.

They always send the dreamers to me.

Well, all I want is to stop dreaming. - May I call you George?

Yeh, I guessÖ

Call me Bill, if you like. - Oh, well that's ok!

However you would feel comfortable.

Dr. Haber, what are we supposed to do here?

We are going to work together. We are going to build good relationship.

You're gonna let me inside, to poke around, find out what's causing those bad dreams of yours.

I assume that's what the problem is, bad dreams.

A sort of.

Why don't you tell me about it?

You'd think I was insane. - I make no judgments, George.

I'm here to help you and that's all. Give it a try.

Suppose I dream, that there's no Dr. Haber.

Now, tomorrow, when I wake up, not only are you gone, but you never existed.

Pretty revealing, wouldn't you say?

Oh, no, I didn't mean that, personally. - Perfectly ok.

You can tell me to go to hell, if you like. It's a part of building our trust.

I didn't mean that. - I'd like you to lie down now, George.

What?

It's all right, go on.

It's all right, George, just relax. Lie back.

Now, I want you to take deep breath and close your eyes.

Patient George Orr. Age 32, voluntary therapeutic treatment, drug abuse.

Recently good health, slightly undernourished, passive, repressed,

maybe in intelligence confining.

You're relaxed, yes? - Yes. - Good.

Now,

I'd like you to tell me more about these dreams that change reality.

Think back to the first one. How old were you?

17. I was 17.

I was still living at home. Aunt Ethel,

my mother's sister was living with us, she was getting a divorce.

She'd been there about six weeks.

And she was always in the way,

she drove everybody crazy.

She kept making a joking play for me.

She was 30, kind of sexy,

she got me up tight. And she was always trying to turn me on.

And one night while we were watching television,

something happened.

How can I have done it! She was my aunt, for God's sake!

I used to have these dreams about her.

And that night I had a really vivid dream.

And then, when I woke up in the morning, aunt Ethel wasn't living with us,

she never had lived with us.

A telegram that had come from Los Angeles, my mother was crying.

Aunt Ethel had been killed in car crash.

And that was it.

It was my first effective dream.

And nobody else noticed that aunt Ethel had suddenly vanished?

My dreams change everything that comes before them. And nobody knows it was me.

I killed her.

George, I want you to understand something;

there is a difference between what you dream and what you do.

But not for me! It's the same thing.

And I can't control what IÖ

What you can control is all of this guilt and anxiety.

That's exactly what we'll be working on together in the next few sessions.

Dr. Haber, you can't help me. - George,

if I thought you're about to lose your balance,

I wouldn't let you out of here so quickly, believe me.

What I will do is give you a prescription for Meprobamate.

That will keep your dreams low-keyed without repressing the dream state entirely.

But it's only temporary. I expect to see you back here, same time next week.

I don't mean to kill her.

Mr. Orr.

ìInfraction of Federal regulations controlling dispensation of medications at autodrugstores.î

It says here, you've begun voluntary treatment with Dr. Haber, correct? - Yes.

You've surrendered your pharmacy card to authorities?

Yes.

I've only have a prescription from Dr. Haber.

Here it is.

All right, I'll have to issue you a temporary pharmacy card.

But don't abuse it. And as is your right, if you have any complaints

here's an HEW approved list of public investigators.

Any other complaints?

Just with my dreams. - Not my jurisdiction. Next!

You gonna use that on me? - Correct!

This is what happens.

First, I'm going to hypnotize you and put you to sleep.

And you'll go through several stages of sleep,

the final one being the dream state or REM sleep.

And the Augmentor here will pass you quickly through those first stages and lock you into ram sleep.

You will allow me to hold you there and watch your brain at work.

My brain? - Yes.

then I'll suggest a dream to you.

In your case, an effective dream.

Oh, that's dangerous!

For the Augmentor changes nothing, George.

Miss Crouch, could you bring Mr. Orr the Consent to Hypnosis form, please. Thank you!

Do you trust me, George?

Ok.

Good, now I'd like you to lye back and get comfortable.

Now, is this comfortable?

Look what a nice healthy signal from your brain.

So at the top screen here, those are your theta rhythms,

nice healthy thetas.

And only a three on susceptibility scale, we could be here all afternoon.

I'm gonna to perform the V-C induction.

I'll see you are not disturbed.

Now, George. I'd like you to relax.

I'd like you to look up at the ceiling.

You don't have a simple brain, my friend, nor a crazy one.

Now, you're beginning to get sleepy, George,

very relaxed, so relaxed, you can't move a muscle.

Your eyelids are very heavy.

You're going to go to sleep now, George.

And while you're sleepy, you'll have no trouble hearing my voice.

And you will wake up, when you hear me call your name three times.

You're going to sleep now.

Can you hear my voice, George?

Mh.

Good.

No sigmoid jags usually prevalent and certain in schizoid personality types.

Sleep patterns ñ normal.

Uh, you're beginning to dream now, George.

REM patterns ñ unusual.

Something very unusual in the whole pointing area.

When I say the word ìAntwerpî

you are going to have a dream I suggest to you.

It will be a pleasant, vivid dream about a horse in a meadow,

beautiful set. It will be a good dream, George.

An effective dream about a horse. ìAntwerp!î

<i>George! George!</i>

<i>George!</i>

Feel ok?

Yeh!

Well, you did dream, my friend! That much I can tell you.

What was it about?

A horse. It was about a horse.

That one.

What about it?

Don't you notice anything unusual about that picture?

Oh, some people find it a bit overwhelming.

You know what's Freud said about horses, staircases and cigars?

Was it here an hour ago? - An hour ago?

Yes, wasn't that a picture of Mount Hood when I came in?

Mount Hood?

Yeh, I remember it, don't you?

George, that is Tammany Hall, the triple crown-winner.

Oh, I'm insane!

No, I'm not insane!

I'm not insane. I know I'm not insane!

So not to drive me insane! - Back up, George!

Dreams are not harmful, for instance, day dreams can be wonderful.

I have them all withy. I dream heroics.

I save the girl, the whole damn planet.

Haber saves the world!

Yeh, I daydream sometimes, that I have a cabin

by the ocean. - Eh,

that's nice. What does that tell you about yourself?

That I am a massacre; nobody can afford a cabin by the ocean anymore.

You know, what I'd like to see, George?

I'd like to see you learn to use your dreams.

Doesn't that strike you as a nice idea?

<i>I don't know.</i>

Well, we'll work on it.

You're feeling very sleepy, George. Very relaxed.

You're going to sleep in a moment.

Now sleep George.

Sleep!

In a moment I'm going to suggest a dream to you.