Perfect cast and a good story

Did you people see the same film I saw?

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

If you are the type of person who is interested in peoples lives this is your film to watch, of course this way is not everyone is but don't let bad reviews put you off.My eyes never left the screen, I found it immensely interesting and quite sad. I feel it is really important for this film to have been made, simply for the fact that because of this film she did not disappear and even though she died alone she didn't live her life in vain. My feeling after watching the film was that in a sense we could all gain perspective - That is how vivid all of our lives are if only we can see it... Joyce may have never known how much people cared but the fact is they had, and what we must remember is there is always someone willing to help, there is always a chance. It seems she had many, for example seeing her old housemate randomly on the street - it could have been a chance to get help - This film is simply a quest to bring back some dignity and life for someone that could have just disappeared off the face of the earth. Now she is in so many peoples memories and I find that quite a noble quest.

The story of an 'Eleanor Rigby' - but, a real one - right amongst us.Living in NYC, the story of Joyce Carol Vincent wasn't known here, but, this film - DREAMS OF A LIFE - make her, her story all too real.While watching, I (as I'm sure, many others) compared their lives to that of Joyce's.We all live isolated lives - some more-so than others.But, the story of Joyce Carol Vincent (who, pardon me - I feel I must say her full name - as a 'remembrance'), is so similar, yet, so different than what we most feel. Or, is it that we convince ourselves we're 'different?' The voices of this film - which the filmmakers had painstakingly researched as much as they could - is told through the words, remembrances of a few people who knew Joyce Carol Vincent.She kept her life - her relations with people - compatmentalised - a 'trait' (?) she got from her family (though Joyce Carol Vincent has 4 sisters, and - at the time of her passing - BOTH parents were alive - they did not take part in this film, nor was where Joyce's final resting place is told).Joyce had told her friends her mum had died when she was 11 years old.The truth was Joyce's mum WAS alive, and did not die until a year or so after Joye's death.The part of this film that really 'walloped' me, was the very ending - the very last shot.I'm not revealing anything by saying it's film of Joyce Carol Vincent; it's the WHERE the footage is from that really just blew me away.It would be great to say that seeing this will make 'us' take those in our lives closer to our hearts.But, I'm a realist.But, for Joyce Carol Vincent, this film serves as an eternal flame.

OK, the subject matter is awful. Woman is so far gone from society that even her "friends" don't look for her when she dies and sits in her apartment for 3 years. The social commentary alone is hard and we should really look at ourselves.But, the movie itself is awful. The way it was filmed was just bad. I grew tired of listening to her so-called "friends" talk about how great she was. Yeah, that's why you went looking for her when you didn't hear from her for 3 years. Hope I never have friends like that. The film made it sound like this woman's family had nothing to do with her. When, in reality, they hired a PI to find her AND were at the inquest into her death. More than her "friends" did. The majority of the film focused on the actress playing Joyce and speculating on what she did. They should have included more of the medical examiner's report, forensics, the friends and why they let her down, and her family. Instead, I was left with more questions. I got more answers from a quick Google search. Just look up the story and read about it instead.

At its core this is a story about a very lonely person, one that we all may know, and how she fell through the cracks of life. One character sums it up perfectly: "It's strange really, it's like she never really existed but was just a figment of our imagination. She was a story. Someone that we all just made up; partly because we just let someone disappeared and die. Someone that we all thought we cared about." A few people have mentioned that this documentary is weak because Joyce, and her story, are mundane and not remarkable." They're absolutely correct, but I see this as a strength for the documentary. Joyce, and her "friends", are not remarkable in any way. Instead, they are normal people who lived their life around someone that was almost a ghost.It's remarkable to watch these people recite, and discover, how little they knew this woman that they considered a friend. And yet these friends, or interviewees, are the best window into Joyce's life. As the title of the film suggests it really is like Joyce only existed in a dream. Her past and future never existed and she was only a shell of a person. I was reminded strongly of the movie Inception while thinking about Joyce. Not to ruin Inception for anyone, but there's a conversation where one character says to another "I can't imagine you with all your complexity, all your perfection and imperfection. You're just a shade..." That's what Joyce was, only a shade of a real person.If there's a lesson to take from this movie it's that we need to do a better job of keeping in contact with our friends. I don't know what happened in Joyce's life that left her to die alone, but no one should have that fate.