Chasing Sleep (2001)

Best movie of this year hands down!

The greatest movie ever!

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

Too bad that Jeff Daniels, an excellent actor, can't get better parts. He showed so much promise as Shirley MacLaine's son-in-law in "Terms of Endearment." Come on, Hollywood. You can do better than this for Mr. Daniels.Daniels is a college professor here who finds that his wife, a music teacher, is missing. He alternately hallucinates due to a lack of sleep. He even dreams that his wife has been found dead. Maybe, this is wishful thinking on his part.We discover that the Mrs. has been having an affair with a gym teacher in her school and is pregnant. To add to the mayhem, a student, named Sadie Crumb, comes over to find out why the college professor hasn't been showing up to class. When Daniels doesn't show up for 2 days, his response to the college secretary, calling to tell him that the dean wants to see him, is memorable.What should the police believe when they find Sadie's bloody clothing on the scene? Incidentally, she had a nosebleed while at the professor's house.Daniels spends most of the time in this movie in the toilet wiping away blood and possible body parts. This is mainly where the script should have placed as well.

This is a great example of a movie that doesn't conform to Hollywood conventions. It is essentially about a man who awakes to realise his wife hasn't come home from work the day before, and what happens to him during the day while he waits for the police. The movie never leaves the man's house, apart from a very short scene in a hospital, and contains no soundtrack. By doing this it creates more tension than if it had a typical Hollywood soundtrack, made up of the usual scary music and screeching sounds. Also as the house begins to fall apart, it becomes more and more claustrophobic. The fact that the storyline is fluid and ambiguous could infuriate or bore some people, however it is chilling without resulting to blood or gore, and never even gives any real answers. Though nowhere near as good, it resembles a David Lynch movie, in that it challenges conventions of plot, and remains ambiguous throughout. Don't watch for any out and out shocks, but it is a movie that will grow on you, and one that you'll still be thinking about later.

As one who loves "different" movies, such as Memento, I hated Chasing Sleep, especially the way they ended it. I felt that the ending made the movie a total waste of time for me. Also, the crawling finger and large baby were ridiculous and took away from the quality of this psychological thriller. I add it to the long list of "could have been a good movie".

first, don't watch the trailer. it shows the end of the movie.second, I think the comparisons to Lynch are dangerous, especially when Lynch has already made a movie about a guy who feels disconnected with his wife and the love they used to have, about a guy who finds himself down a bloody path, about a guy who finds himself in a really bad dream, indistinguishable from his reality...Okay, I'll just say it straight out: Chasing Sleep is a farm-league Lost Highway. If you know someone who likes creepy psychological movies, but couldn't dig Lost Highway, they'll probably like Chasing Sleep. Spells out the main character's situation a bit more plainly. That's because the setting's plainer (the entire movie's in the man's house, a lifeless six-figure suburban hovel), the characters are plainer (especially against Lynch characters), and the plot is a lot simpler -- almost predictable. There's a couple of familiar faces for TV junkies, but this movie rests squarely on Jeff Daniels' shoulders. He does alright as an Everyman on the breaking point; at least, I believed that he was spiritually exhausted throughout the picture. Given the story's setup and flavor, I think the hollowness of the other performances are intentional, avoiding the intimacy that might break this spell of solitude on the main character. Or the actors might have just had too little to work with.Conclusions? the movie's slightly clever, some intriguing shots, still haven't figured out about the baby... But I can't watch this without thinking about Lost Highway, Vanilla Sky (Abre Los Ojos), or Dr Caligari, and what's already been done. Still, good enough for cable...