Partners in New Age Film Fulfill Their ‘Dreams’

In Hollywood, it helps to have a “hook” to sell a movie.

Producers Stephen Simon and Barnet Bain, whose film “What Dreams May Come,” starring Robin Williams, opens today, believe they have such an angle--and they’re banking their entire business on it.

The name of their firm, Metafilmics--which sounds more like a homeopathic remedy than a production company--instantly identifies the kind of product Simon and Bain hope to capitalize on, a marriage of metaphysics and cinema.

The partners believe that by exclusively focusing on material “that makes people feel more connected to each other and who they are,” they will be filling a void in an industry that has been slow to recognize such movies as a distinct genre in the same way that thrillers, comedies and horror films are.

Simon and Bain said they created their company as an antidote to the cynical and violent films Hollywood serves up.

“There’s a tremendous appetite for movies that provide something to nurture the soul . . . that will engage you, if only to ask the big questions,” suggested Bain. “You can’t just be splashing around on the surface all the time.”

Simon and Bain think their timing may be particularly good since people may be more concerned with philosophical issues as the millennium approaches and global economic turmoil is on the rise.

“People are starting to ask questions about what it really means to be human,” said Simon, adding: “There’s a lot of fear out there. The whole concept of what it really means to be happy is being played out on a national and international scale.”

The Market’s Already There

The producers contend that the movie business is behind the curve of other industries in getting involved in the New Age trends that finds singers like Yanni and Enya topping the music charts and such books as “The Celestine Prophecy” selling 12 million copies.

Hollywood, they say, has always viewed the box-office success of “Forrest Gump,” “Ghost,” “Field of Dreams,” “Michael,” “Phenomenon,” “City of Angels” and others as anomalies rather than representing a viable market in itself.

“If you look at these titles, they perform beyond every expectation, yet nobody ever steps back and says, ‘You know, these films consistently perform and there is an appetite for them,’ ” said Bain, who wrote the screenplay for the spiritually themed “Jesus” for Warner Bros. The film is still playing in some parts of the world and has grossed $50 million on a cost of $6 million.

A heck of a lot more money is riding on the producers’ first joint endeavor, “What Dreams May Come,” which was entirely financed by PolyGram Filmed Entertainment at a production cost of $85 million.

Produced in conjunction with Interscope Communications, the film is PolyGram’s most expensive movie ever. It’s taking this huge financial risk at a time when the company is bleeding red ink and in the throes of being sold and possibly dismantled.

“This movie is a very, very bold departure in entertainment,” said Simon, “because 85% of it takes place in fully realized afterlife settings” that were rendered by blending state-of-the-art technology with traditional cinematic techniques.

Directed by Simon Ward (“Map of the Human Heart”) and penned by Oscar-winning screenwriter Ron Bass (“Rain Man”) based on a book by Richard Matheson, the film is billed as an epic adventure/love story about a doctor (Williams) searching for his wife (Annabella Sciorra) in the afterlife. Cuba Gooding Jr. also stars in the film.

“The wonderful films that have been regarded as afterlife films like ‘Ghost’ and ‘Heaven Can Wait’ were basically earthbound. The afterlife experience of the Robin Williams character is very subjective to him . . . the conceit of this movie is that we create our own realities.”

Simon, who produced the 1979 cult classic “Somewhere in Time,” which had a similar theme about eternal love transcending time, acknowledged that “What Dreams May Come” required “a leap of faith on behalf of the people financing it.”

It was a film that took Simon more than 15 years to get made. He credits Interscope founder Ted Field, the project’s executive producer with Scott Kroopf, as the “major hero” in its finally coming together.

The producer said Matheson gave him the galleys to “Dreams” as a “gift” 20 years ago during preproduction on “Somewhere in Time,” which was based on the author’s own script.

“It was in development at different places with different directors,” said Simon, noting that Wolfgang Petersen was attached when the project was at 20th Century Fox, “but we never got close to getting it made because there was a huge regime change, and the new regime didn’t like it.”

A Meeting of the Minds--and Spirit

In general, the industry “wasn’t ready for it,” said Simon, who previously served as a top executive for such legendary producers as Dino de Laurentiis and Ray Stark. After leaving De Laurentiis’ company in 1993, Simon--known as Stephen Deutsch before reclaiming his birth name two years ago--took a year off from Hollywood to immerse himself in metaphysical and spiritual studies.

Finally, in 1994, Bass was commissioned to write the script and MGM initially funded its development before dropping the project.

Simon’s relationship with Field and Kroopf dates back to the mid-1980s, when they produced the comedy hit “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.” It was then that he gave Field a copy of the “Dreams” book.

When Field read Bass’ script in the spring of 1996, Simon said he made two promises. “He said, ‘We’re going to get this movie made and we’re never going to creatively interfere with you.’ In the 2 1/2 years we’ve been partners on this, they’ve been true to their word.”

Interscope was instrumental in getting Williams, who had starred in its 1995 hit “Jumanji,” and getting its parent company, PolyGram, to finance the movie.

“Dreams” is the first film to come out of the Metafilmics venture, which Simon and Bain launched in 1996 after meeting at a conference and realizing they shared a similar vision for a unique production company.

The producers have a number of other projects in the works, including a 10-part HBO miniseries on the “evolution of consciousness,” produced in association with Francis Ford Coppola; a feature comedy called “Between the Lines,” about kids picking their own parents; and an updated version of “The Stepford Wives.”

They hope that while there’s always been a rich tradition of spiritually uplifting films ranging from “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “2001: A Space Odyssey” to “E.T.,” the recent rash of films that includes “What Dreams May Come,” “City of Angels” and “Simon Birch”--as well as the upcoming “Meet Joe Black,” “Instinct” and “Practical Magic”--suggests that they’re on to something.