Review of Sleeper (2012) by David B — 20 Jan 2010
SLEEPER is another pleasant but slight Allen Cartoon Comedy a la BANANAS, this time around starring Woody as a Greenwich Village health-food store manager who is awoken from a cryogenic slumber 200 years in the future.
Because of the film's futuristic setting (and the film's small budget), SLEEPER haplessly comes acrost as the most dated of Allen's '70s comedies. Nevertheless it is a charming light comedy, trading in some of the ADD-jokery of BANANAS, and hence many laughs, for a stronger emphasis on character and story development.
Diane Keaton makes her first appearance in a Woody Allen film as a highly-strung, nitwit poet turned-underground terrorist (at one point singing a revolutionary's anthem borrowed from BANANAS - how's that for an in-joke?).
Apologies to Janet Margolin and Louise Lasser (of TAKE THE MONEY AND RUN and BANANAS, respectively), but Keaton's appearance in SLEEPER marks the first compelling female presence in an Allen film, and the film is all the better for Keaton's charming, frenzied performance.
Allen and Keaton's warm and fluid comedic chemistry, more than anything, make SLEEPER a keeper.
This review of Sleeper (2012) was written by David B on 20 Jan 2010.
Sleeper has generally received mixed reviews.
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