The Science of Sleep

Starring: Gael García Bernal, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Alain Chabat

Written by: Michael Gondry

Directed by: Michael Gondry

Distributor: Warner Independent Pictures

Rated: Rated R

As dreamlike as the cinema can be, films that cast a lens directly at dreams often fail to capture their full magnitude. A recent example is Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean’s 2005 release, MirrorMask. Gaiman and McKean’s film was a visually dazzling fantasy adventure that did the dream world justice. With The Science of Sleep, director Michael Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) mixes dream reality with romantic drama in a way that is not entirely breathtaking but makes for an entertaining time nonetheless.

Gael García Bernal puts in a charismatically strange starring performance as Stephane Miroux, a man who has difficulty separating his dreams from reality. The death of his father has brought him back to France from Mexico and his mother has gotten him work doing manual layout for promotional calendars. He is depressed until he finds out that a beautiful girl named Stephanie (the strikingly exotic Charlotte Gainsbourg) is living next door. Stephane promptly takes a liking to Stephanie that rapidly inflates into obsession.

The romance plays out in fun, sometimes awkwardly quirky moments that are nonetheless obvious and predictable. The story would be largely indistinguishable from an uncharacteristically engrossing Nora Ephron romantic comedy, were it not for the surreal quality in which Gondry submerses every aspect of the film.

This dreamlike quality works better in subtleties than it does in the more visually overwhelming moments. English, Spanish and French seem to flow seamlessly in and out of the dialogue. Every time someone says something in a different language, there’s a clear, rational reason for it, but if you let logic go and merely listen, the effect is novel.

Stephane’s internal world is first presented as a television studio made entirely out of brown cardboard. In it, Stephane hosts his own television show and is the center of all things. The rest of his world breathes with a fantastic stop-motion animation landscape of corrugated cardboard, cardboard tubing, cellophane and similar materials, the effect of which is a very cosmetic and uninteresting Brothers Quay feel. But Stephane’s dream world is fascinating, not in how it’s all being shown, but in what it’s showing. Gradually, it becomes clear that Stephane’s malformed understanding of the “real” world is not only presented in moments of obvious dream, but also at moments that seem otherwise rational. It is here, in that hazy realm between dream and reality, that The Science of Sleep is most engrossing.

The easiest way to end a film like this is to show stable, unfiltered “objective” reality for what it is and end with a bittersweet shot of fantasy before the end credits. Sadly, this is exactly what Gondry does. It doesn’t quite work. Bad ending. Good film. VS