Rish's Reviews
Sleepless (aka Non Ho Sonno, or "I Haven't Slept," according to Italian Professor Rish Cornuto Outfield) is the newest film from HFC's most-reviewed director, Dario Argento. In it, Argento tells the delightful tale of two quirky and handsome characters who fall in love despite not meeting until, infuriatingly, the last ten seconds of the film. It surprises us with . . . wait a minute, that's Sleepless In Seattle! I reviewed the wrong movie!
Okay, in Sleepless, when a vicious murderer, long thought dead, turns up again after seventeen years, the old cop (Max Von Sydow) who was originally after him and the son of the killer's last victim team up to solve the case. The murderer, known as the Dwarf (but is he actually a dwarf?), kills to a nursery rhyme and leaves animal cutouts as clues at the crime scenes. Will they uncover the clues? Will the Dwarf claim another victim? Will Meg Ryan get together with Tom Hanks even though Bill Pullman is a perfectly nice guy?
I doubt it will win any new fans for Argento, but it's neat to see him do a giallo set in the 21st Century (or whatever the year 2000 was). The film had a very retro feel. In fact, except for the use of a cellphone, this could easily have been made in the 70's. Also, I would have described the music, which was odd and right out of the 70's, as very reminiscent of Goblin, but then I discovered that it WAS by Goblin.
Max Von Sydow was very likable as a retired, totally senile old police chief. He has never been an actor I was very familiar with, until the last couple of months. And he was very good. His accent actually helped the film, whereas the lame dubbing on some of the other characters distracted.
As usual, Argento has a flair for the garishly violent. A horrible nail clipping scene was unbelievably gruesome. On one particularly graphic death, they actually used puppets! There were murders by fountain pen, by knife, by wall, a heart attack, another knife, a gunshot, drowning, but when a character was killed by an English horn (very similar to a clarinet), I shrieked, "Oh my god!" and listed that as our Weapon of Choice. In fact, later in the film, Von Sydow kindly points out how unusual it was.
There was full nudity in the first five minutes (that's not one of the Skulls, but it is pretty neat). Argento's style is once again clear from the first shot. The script wasn't bad, and the film featured nice lighting and interesting locales, but the ending was lame, especially in how they explain everything away. Too bad. The film ends up being neither bad nor particularly good, and nobody wants that.
Line To Remember: "So now, take a look at the weapons and the way he uses them. Pruning knife, musical instrument (English horn), rope, drowned, bashed against the wall, and a hatchet. The English horn . . . my what a strange choice."