9/10/2023 0 Comments Movie while you were sleepingAnd romantic comedies have to work even HARDER to be good because there are such old cliches everywhere … you can’t just rely on the cliches … you have to still be SPECIFIC. And instead of the voiceover just telling us: “I love this guy … he’s perfect …” we get to see a little subtle moment of his kindness which tells us WHY she thinks he’s perfect. She is looking for love – and so of course she is tuned in to the DETAILS of this guy. Now – the moment is not a huge deal, it’s not filmed like he’s the reincarnation of Christ, but Bullock does mention it later … as something she notices that he does, habitually: let old people go first. BUT … there’s a tiny detail in the first footage we see of him, running to get the train … Bullock stares at him longingly from behind the toll booth window … he runs to get the train, the doors are closing, and he jams his way in … and then holds them open for a little old woman who is right behind him – he lets her go in first. Handsomeness like that seems … suspicious. And here’s a nice detail: Peter Gallagher is so bizarrely good-looking, kind of overblown, in the Billy Zane vein … that you immediately don’t like him. She has a fantasy that she will someday meet this “Prince”. We can see that Bullock is living in a fantasy world … because of all she has lost in her life. It’s not a SILLY movie … made for MORONS, like so many romantic comedies are. She works for the CTA in Chicago in a token booth – and every morning she watches him get on the train. She goes off the deep end when talking about her “Prince” (played by Peter Gallagher) – a man she has never met. It sets it up … her voiceover does not tell the end of the story … and we can hear her insecurity in her voice, and also her … well, frankly, her delusional nature. Listen to how she says the word “Milwaukee”. The opening, narrated wonderfully and very … HUMANly … by Sandra Bullock is sepia-toned, and yet it maintains that witty energy. The music doesn’t insist that you care … it just supports the general mood. The mood of the film is sincere, and also WITTY. There’s music playing beneath almost every single scene, and instead of being annoying, or too obvious, or … too much – it just adds to the MOOD. BAD.) While You Were Sleeping is a romantic comedy, sure – but it has that ever-elusive quality that so few filsm have: it has WIT. So often in romantic comedies, you get total over-kill with the soundtrack – they bash you over the head with their message (Hugh Grant strolling sadly thru the streets after breaking up with Julia Roberts in Notting Hill and what begins to play? “Ain’t no sunshine when she’s gone”. For some reason, the soundtrack to this film strikes me as PERFECT. To the JOY that is the film While You Were Sleeping – one of my eternal favorites!! Reveling in Bill Pullman!! To the most obsessive degree possible! Whoo-hoo!! I also had a blast writing it over the last 2 weeks. I do a shot-by-shot breakdown of While You Were Feckin’ Sleeping, for God’s sake. This is basically a moment-to-moment analysis of the film. I chose as a focus the film While You Were Sleeping. I wanted to write a post about my love for Bill Pullman.
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