| Liebestraum | |
| Director: | Mike Figgis |
| Producer: | Eric Fellner |
| Starring: | Kevin Anderson Pamela Gidley Bill Pullman Kim Novak Zach Grenier |
| Music: | Mike Figgis |
| Cinematography: | Juan Ruiz Anchía |
| Editing: | Martin Hunter |
| Studio: | Initial Pathé Entertainment |
| Distributor: | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| Runtime: | 112 minutes |
| Country: | United States |
| Language: | English |
| Budget: | £5 million[1] |
| Gross: | $133,645 (Domestic)[2] |
Liebestraum (German for "dream of love") is a 1991 American mystery film written and directed by Mike Figgis and starring Kevin Anderson, Pamela Gidley, Bill Pullman, Zach Grenier, Alicia Witt and Taina Elg, with Kim Novak in her last film role.[3] [4] [5]
Opening as the Ralston department stores closes for the night, an unseen man and woman engage in an illicit affair as a silhouetted man closes in on them. Both appear to be shot dead before the man presumably commits suicide.
Thirty years later, Nick (Kevin Anderson), a professor of architecture in upstate New York arrives in Elderstown, Illinois to be with his birth mother (Kim Novak) in the final days of her illness; he was adopted and never met her before. That night, he becomes intrigued with the building across from his hotel. On the first day, he runs into Paul (Bill Pullman), a college friend, whose construction company is demolishing an old downtown department store where a murder-suicide happened thirty years before. The building is a beautiful cast-iron construction, so Nick wants to study it before the demolition. Nick saves Paul's life when a piece of the buildings façade crumbles and Nick pushes him to safety. To say thanks, Nick is invited to a birthday party for Paul's wife, Jane. At the party, Paul introduces Nick to his wife, Jane (Pamela Gidley), a photographer who wants to portray the same building. Over the next four days, Nick and Jane's attraction grows, as Nick explores the old building, attends his mother's bedside, and unravels the truth that links both of them with the developing events in his and Jane's life.
It is uncovered that the man shot and killed at the start of the film is Nick's father, and that the woman survived but in a fragile state. The third gunshot heard was Nick's mother killing the private investigator hired to uncover the affair. Nick and Jane, in a parallel with the man and woman in the beginning engage in an affair as well. This scene is discovered by Paul, but instead of killing the two, leaves in tears. Breaking the cycle of murder, as Nick's birth mother dies.
When Liebestraum made its VHS debut, it was released in two editions — the R-rated theatrical version and an unrated director's cut. The DVD release, part of MGM's Avant-Garde Cinema series, features only the R-rated version. However, the deleted scene that marks the single difference between the two edits is included as a bonus feature on the disc.[6]