Wednesday, July 11, 2007

It Makes Me Feel Schizometric


I am up in Newcastle for the week and watched Michel Gondry's The Science of Sleep last night. Brilliant. For the first hour of the film I was delighted--it was was whimsical, creative, fresh--then the saturation of delight, fantasy, whimsy began to take its toll. The film became prfound, frightening, even tragic. I don't even know how to speak about it without giving too much away. But I can say that this is a rare film which enters the world of dreams in a very poignant, beautiful, yet frightening way--its creativity is astounding. But its accuracy is even more so. The main character, Stehane, lives inside his head--constantly between the moments of waking and sleeping. His dream world continually merges with "real" life, and he lives according to his most base, subconscious impulses, hs primal, childlike desires. This iability to edit the self, to tame one's deepest urges proves to be tragically isolating. Watch this film--let me know what you think.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

yeah, i was weirded out by it, too. i think you described it perfectly. he never developed any kind of filter. his childlike impulses ruled his actions. i like movies like that, where it's so dreamy it feels familiar.