The Science of Sleep

Dreams are one of life's great intangibles. We all share them, but in wildly varying degrees. In The Science of Sleep, Michel Gondry ambitiously tackles the world of the dormant subconscious and the result is easily the most imaginative film you'll see this year.

At the center of the film is Stéphane (Gael Garcia Bernal). He is, quite literally, a dreamer. He suffers from the disastrous inability to distinguish between reality and dream state. Correspondingly, neither can the audience. In his dreams, he's the grand facilitator of "Stéphane TV" "” a hectic world in which he serves as both the on-air personality and camera operator. He often begins with a preamble about the mechanics of dreams and then moves on to a repressed memory or a fantastical scenario incorporating fragmented scraps of his day.

As we have come to expect from Gondry's feature films, he opens on a melancholy note with Stéphane dreaming of attending a concert with his deceased father. On-screen we see a spirograph-like commingling of colors, while aurally we here Stéphane conversing with his father, including a reminder that he has passed away.

In reality, after the death of Stéphane's father, his French mother, Christine (Miou-Miou) lures him back to France under the guise of a lucrative job offer. Stéphane, an aspiring calendar artist, is dismayed to find out that his job is not creative, as his mother had suggested, but rather a dull cycle of mindless drudgery. At the office he meets the abrasively crude Guy (the hilarious Alain Chabert), who is just as bored with his job as Stéphane is, but idles away the time making inappropriate sexual comments.

Moving back into his old apartment, Stéphane meets his new neighbor Stéphanie (Charlotte Gainsberg) and ends up hurting his hand while helping deliver her piano. This isn't a conventional meet-cute. The two have an awkward first exchange and an even more unconventional courtship. But Stéphane is so constantly overcome by his dream world that he can't discern how Stéphanie feels about him or, for that matter, how he really feels about her.

You don't have to look far to see the connections between the character of Stéphane and Gondry himself, who for the first time in his career, serves as the film's sole screenwriter. Stéphane's tousled hair and sweater-centric outfits emulate Gondry's physical appearance, and his endless tinkering on charmingly infantile inventions recalls Gondry's technical wizardry with the camera.

Gondry has clearly spent a lot of time analyzing and recounting his own dreams because the dream sequences in this film feel as authentic as one can imagine; as Stéphanie points out, "Randomness is very hard to achieve." In particular, an extended dream sequence late in the film veers so radically between vignettes that it feels marvelously uncanny; you forget they are supposed to be dreams, while simultaneously recognizing how much the

The set design is meticulous, with each successive scene interweaving minor details from the previous. Due to the uncertainty of dream and reality, you could watch the film multiple times without being able to tell when Stéphane is experiencing something for the first time or when he is being influenced by a nagging memory.

As the film progresses, Stéphane becomes an increasingly sad character, which is augmented by the film's autobiographical quality. Early on, Stéphane and Stéphanie share a heartbreakingly sweet scene in which they engage in the joy of creativity and their childish jocundity is infectious. But the more we get to know him, the more that Stéphane's disillusionment becomes extremely detrimental. Ultimately, we have a strongly emotional film in which we're not sure what emotion exactly to feel "” leaving a slightly foul taste in the mouth, all the more unpleasant after the initial sweetness of whimsy.

The experience is not as satisfying as Gondry's 2004 masterpiece, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, perhaps because the premise is flimsier and the conclusion less poignant. But even still, the film reiterates what a visionary Gondry is. Every frame is brimming with creativity and his craftsmanship is unchallenged.

One minor word of caution, though: Despite the trailer's deft disguise, much of the film is spoken in Gondry's native French. But this shouldn't be seen as a cause for concern; the art of language is a very important facet to the film. The difficulty of alternating between languages is an overriding motif and the inability to express things through words is a frequent occurrence.

As a slight attempt to avoid discouragement, even with my very rudimentary understanding of French I was able to follow much of the dialogue without constantly referring to the subtitles. This is a blessing because, with a film like this, you rarely want to divert your attention from the impressive visuals.

Movie Grade: A-

Synopsis:

A man held captive by the people in his dreams tries to wake himself up and take control of his own imaginings.