Reality, or Fantasy? in anticlimatic

There is a particular plot device in (good) horror scenarios in which the pleasant reality we think we know is actually a fiction disguising a horror, and the goal becomes escape. Movies like 2010 “Moon,” or “Jacob’s Ladder” from 1994 I believe, fit this (among many many others).

But there is also the plot device variation where reality is knowingly horrible from the outset, and escape is again the goal, into the same reality- but a more liberated version. Movies like “Shawshank Redemption,” or “The Fugitive.”

And then there is my favorite variant, same genre- but slightly different from above: When reality is knowingly horrible, but there is no escape to an liberated version of it, so Fantasy becomes the only place with which to run. “A Stop At Willoughby,” “Somewhere In Time,” or “Source Code.”

My favorite part abut the last one here, is that it’s often up in the air whether or not some kind of miracle will happen, like in all the ones I mentioned above, or if instead the fantasy that is pursued is ultimately crushed by reality (“1984,” “Joker 2”).

I am always rooting for fantasy to be made reality by sheer will power alone.