Friday, January 30, 2009

Waking Life

Waking Life is a boring test of patience in many scenes (mostly in the beginning). But then you're suddenly hit with its brilliance. Most scenes are lectures on life and existentialism and they're hard to get through. But you're rewarded with piece of mind. It takes you out of day to day life and places you in a dream.
The entire film is following one character as he treks through his subconscious dream life. The rotoscoping animation was beautiful but sometimes left me a little weary. Sometimes I wished I could watch the film un-animated. But for the most part, it works.
Of Linklater's work, this is more along the lines of a Slacker 2. Waking Life improves on the concepts of Slacker in that the ideas are expressed more clearly.
I still don't quite know how I feel about the film as a whole. It definitely makes you think. But I feel like there was just A LOT of talking. I was tempted to skip ahead on the DVD, but thankfully it picks up speed towards the middle.
Here are two of the best scenes...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1n19SF5IqE&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtuYWyjk4ZI&feature=related

Linklater remains one of my favorite directors because of projects like these. Even if they don't end up being my favorite films, they're still so innovative and experimental.

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