Review of Sleepwalk with Me (2012) by Pragyan T — 11 Sep 2013

I'm a big indie movie-buff, so Mike Birbiglia's Sleepwalk with Me was on the top of my indie-watchlist.

Stand-up comic Mike Birbiglia makes his debut as actor-writer-producer-director in this Woody Allenesque fusion of relationship problems and self exploration. With the legacy of indie movies never getting above 7 rating on IMDB, Birbiglia's romantic comedy glimmers beyond all the conventional scrutiny.

Birbiglia stars as Matt Pandamiglio, a struggling unfunny standup comic, who is not sure about marrying his longtime girlfriend Abby while his sleepwalking disorder intensifies, piling up more mess in his life.

I'm fond of indie flicks, like Sleepwalk with Me, because of their protagonists. Mainly they are Average Joes that resemble the majority of audience. They are organic, fat, nervous, nerdy and vulnerable. Empathy is an automatic process if an Average Joe struggles throughout the movie.

The movie capitalizes in "Breaking the Fourth Wall", which is an intricate device to pull off. Annie Hall and Ferris Bueller's Day Off, till date are only two movies who have done this perfectly. And we find screenwriters unknowingly exploiting this device without any authority.

Sleepwalking has been in the movies since decades and comedy films have tried so hard to extract the physical humor from sleepwalking that it has somehow become a cliché. But Birbiglia turns his Sleepwalking Disorder (which he also suffers from in real life) into a unique and humorous sub-plot that it saves the movie from becoming one of those snotty pretentious romantic comedies. Moreover, the character's growth, from a bland comic to a more confessional one with his own voice, is certainly gratifying.

I think Birbiglia should've exploited the sleepwalking disorder a bit more as it would've infused more conflict in the script. The relationship with the girlfriend and the confusion whether "she is the one" or not has been tussled in so many romantic comedies that I was exhausted to see the same thing again in this movie.

The supporting cast is immensely colorful that they have their own attributes and quirks, which makes the movie even more engrossing. Like the dorky mother who innocently says, "Oh! I ordered the cake online" and an overprotective father who yells and says, "Why are you yelling?" Birbiglia has created characters who are not scene fillers but scene stealers.

The mockumentary style of the film and the blend of tones with equal amount of decent humor make Birbiglia's Sleepwalk with Me an imperfect but appreciable effort.