Genre: Sci-Fi/Drama
Director: Charlie McDowell
Writer: Seth Overton
Based on the video game
Cast: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Zazie Beetz, David Harbour, Carrie Coon, John Goodman, Lakeith Stanfield, Gretchen Mol, Lucas Hedges, Maddie Ziegler
Plot: A man sits in a wheelchair on the top of a tall snowy mountain, with an orange sky serving as a backdrop. He sits there in awe, admiring the staggering view. Beside him, Dr. Eva Rosalene (Zazie Beetz) and Dr. Neil Watts (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) give him a reassuring smile. He attempts to put his barefoot on the icy ground. As his foot touches the ground, a freezing tingle runs up his spine. Increasingly confident, he attempts another few steps. His feet tremble, but not because of his physical impairment. It's because he is overwhelmed with joy. The text "NAME OF SUBJECT: DAVID JOHNSON / DREAM RECORDING PROPERTY OF SIGMUND CORPORATION." appears on screen.
Sigmund Corp. uses a technology that can create artificial memories. They offer this as a "wish fulfillment" service to people on their death beds. Since these artificial memories conflict with the patient's real memories, the procedure is only legal to do on people without much time left to live.
After becoming disillusioned with the fact that the company they work for has lost his meaning in the name of profits and appeasing stakeholders, Sigmund Corp. employees Dr. Eva Rosalene and Dr. Neil Watts decide to go rogue and use its devices to help those that could not afford it.
In their first pro bono mission, they are tasked with fulfilling the lifelong dream of the dying Johnny Wyles (David Harbour). His caretaker Isabelle (Gretchen Mol) tells them that Johnny wants to go to the moon, although he doesn't know why. The doctors plan to insert themselves into his memories and traverse backwards through his life via mementos. With each leap to an important moment in Johnny's memories, they learn more about him and what brought him to his current position in life, including his largely unhappy marriage to his childhood sweetheart, River (Carrie Coon), who has now passed away.
Upon reaching his different moments in his life, the doctors attempt to insert his desire to go to the moon. Supposedly, Johnny's mind would create new memories based on that desire, and Johnny would die believing he lived without any regrets. However, Johnny's mind does not create the new memories as planned. Dr. Watts and Dr. Rosalene must better understand what is behind this desire of his in order to fulfill it.
In one of the memories, a young Johnny (Lucas Hedges) tries to escape one of his bullies. The bully's face is blurred, same for everyone around him, sign that this is a memory that Johnny only sightly remembers or has tried to repress. Neil wants to intervene, but Eva reminds him that they can only indirectly interact with the patient as it is dangerous to add memories of people the patients haven't met. As Johnny runs around the high-school's hallways lights begin to flicker. Eve notes that his heart rate has increased because of this nightmare and they might have to end the session. However, his heart rate returns back to normal, when someone comes to his rescue. That someone is Nicholas (Lakeith Stanfield), a soft-spoken yet commanding figure, who would become Johnny's best friend from that moment.
When some of the memories are too fuzzy to analyze, Neil and Eva decide to get more information from Isabelle, his caretaker. They find out that River and Isabelle were close friends since high-school and that River suffered from Asperger's Syndrome. She had a very strong attachment throughout her life to a stuffed platypus. She had an obsession throughout her life for making origami paper rabbits in attempt to deal with anxiety.
With this newfound information, the two Sigmund employees decide to search for the memory in which Johnny and River met. Instead, they enter a memory which once again raises Johnny's heart rate. He is in a car with Nicholas. A car crash ensues. Nicholas doesn't survive.
As they attempt to switch to another memory, Neil and Eva are disconnected. Men in Sigmund uniform have entered the Wyles residence. They attempt to confiscate the Sigmund dream device, but Eva stops them and demands to speak to Cornelius Dawkins, the CEO (John Goodman). Another employee brings a tablet and video calls Dawkins. Eva tries to explain to him that they have been disconnected during a traumatic memory and they have to go back or else they risk losing the patience with this being his last memory. Dawkins is unperturbed by this prospect, but when Neil tells him that he's going to tell the press that the Sigmund device has caused someone to die reliving the most traumatic event in his past again and again, Dawkins agree to let them continue, with the added condition that they are no longer associated with the Sigmund Corporation and everything they do from now on is on their own accord.
Neil and Eva resume their work. They find out that the trauma of the event put Johnny in a mental hospital where he was given beta blockers to induce memory loss of the tragic event. There, he met a young River (Maddie Ziegler), who he eventually married. In another memory, he is during class and sees River for the first time. Neil and Eve notice the discrepancy and decide to ask Isabelle whether River and Johnny met in high-school for the first time. She confirms that they never went to the same high-school, which means that suddenly disconnecting from the traumatic memory has led to blank spaces which were filled with artificial memories.
They decide to go back further in time, in an attempt to figure out when did they actually meet. They go back to a day in which a carnival came to town. A young River tries her luck at a carnival game, but misses every shot. Johnny is next line, he manages to win a toy platypus which he gifts to her. This is the first day they met. After a wonderful time at the carnival, they look at the night sky and made up a constellation: a rabbit with the moon as its belly. The two agree to meet at the same place the following year, with Johnny promising that should he forget or get lost, the two would "regroup on the moon". However, a few months later, Nicholas is killed in the car accident and Johnny is put on medication which causes him to forget his first encounter with River. Only this vague desire to go to the moon remains.
After meeting River in the mental hospital and marrying her, River becomes obsessed with trying to jostle his memories. Even during adulthood, she is attached to the toy platypus Johnny had gifted her. She crafts hundreds of paper bunnies every day. She wears a blue and yellow dress at their wedding, representing the constellation they made up during their first encounter. However, River was unable to make Johnny remember before she died, and Johnny was left with lingering guilt and an inexplicable desire to go to the moon.
In the present, Rosalene and Watts eventually implant a memory sequence in which Nicholas did not die, and lived on to become a popular author, and Johnny did not meet River again until they started working together at NASA. As the comatose real-life Johnny begins to die, he imagines going on a moon mission with River. During the launch, River holds out a hand to him. The moon appears through a window on the ship, and Johnny takes her hand as his heart monitor flatlines.
Neil and Eva unplug the device and put it back in a metal briefcase with the Sigmund logo on it. They shake Isabella's hand and leave to the next patient with a bittersweet smile on their faces.
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