A computer in love with a woman yet it can't kiss her, can't wrap any arms around her and it is jealous of its human owner who can touch her and hold her. This is part of the charm of the wonderful, sweetly vivacious romantic movie "Electric Dreams." I had my cinematic crushes back in the 1980's and one of them was that orange-reddish-haired Molly Ringwald, and the other was Virginia Madsen. She is the intelligent girlfriend in "Electric Dreams," a cellist who yearns for that ideal romance and music helps complement that yearning. Same is true of her clumsy romantic lead, Miles (Lenny Von Dohlen), who deeply loves the cellist and still feels he can't compete with a jealous computer.
The computer in "Electric Dreams" works like most fantasy computers at that time - it can control the lock mechanism on the front door, make calls to a radio station, watch endless TV and, most importantly, compose a love song that sounds suspiciously like a song by Culture Club. Miles, an architect in the making, is trying to conceive of an "earthquake brick" that will help preserve buildings during an earthquake. He is always late to work and keeps running into things or people despite wearing glasses (what a stereotype straight out of the Harold Lloyd school). Miles moves into a duplex and right above him is the talented, curly-blonde neighbor, Madeline (Madsen) and though he finds her alluring, his concentration is on his computer. He hopes it can develop the design of the earthquake brick and when he tries to connect to the main database at his work, the computer starts to amass more memory than its CPU can handle. After remote-controlling every in his apartment, the love song it composes helps Miles with his developing relationship with Madeline.
The jealousy begins when the computer, known as Edgar (effectively and creepily voiced by Bud Cort), wants to kiss Madeline and is sure she would love him. Miles laughs off Edgar's romantic delusions yet Madeline thinks that Miles has a keen interest in music (he doesn't, of course). Miles can't bring himself to tell her sooner than later that he can't compose songs, and the movie becomes a slight variant on the "Cyrano de Bergerac" theme. Still, Edgar has a hold on Miles' life and it can even sense his footsteps outside the apartment's staircase (no computer in 1984 could do half of the things Edgar does in this movie).
"Electric Dreams" is a vibrant, almost mellifluous musical treat of a movie. When the song "Love is Love" plays (pretty much like a music video considering the director, Steve Barron, started off making music videos) and Madeline hears the song playing as Miles stands besides his computer, it is a tender moment to make couples swoon for each other. The movie also has some horror spiked into its climax where Edgar goes nuts, practically chasing Miles with its remote access to the appliances all over the apartment. Ultimately, what is most romantic and hopeful about the movie is not just Edgar recognizing its limitations as non-human entity that can't possibly love any human, but that Madeline loves Miles unconditionally. "Electric Dreams" is a wonderfully spirited movie to treasure - it will make you feel as if you are floating on air.
