Sleeper By the time the film Sleeper went into pre-production Woody Allen had been established as a director who had complete control over his work. Taking advantage of this, Woody had a brilliant idea for a four hour science fiction film that would be divided into two acts. There would even be an intermission between the acts. The first act would be a New York comedy centering around Woody's character as a clarinetist who gets frozen in a cryogenic machine at the end. Act two would be Woody waking up 500 years later in the future and the comedy surrounding that. In the end, only the second act in the future was made. Sleeper opens in the year 2173. Miles Monroe (Woody Allen) is awakened by a team of scientists who discover that he was frozen after a successful ulcer operation under the consent of his cousin. The process of reviving Miles sets the film up for its tone: slapstick. The first ten minutes of the film look and come across as a serious science fiction film. All the sets are very futuristic, with bubble shaped cars and Orwellian architecture. As soon as the tin foil is taken away from the face of Miles though all feelings of this film being taken seriously go out the door. Miles walks around like Frankenstien as security guards examine all the monkey business. The doctors smuggle Miles into their home and try to explain what has happened to him. Miles, it turns out, was the owner of Happy Carrot Health Food Store in 1973 before the operation. He was also a clarinet player in a jazz band called the Ragtime Rascals. "I can't believe this. My doctor said I'd be up in five days. He was off by 195 years. I knew it was too good to be true. I parked right near the hospital." Between the time Miles was frozen and when he was unthawed, there was a nuclear bomb dropped on the United States that destroyed most of the documents supplying history. Miles is asked to examine photographs salvaged and identify their importance. When presented with a video clip of ABC's Wide World of Sports one of the doctors believes that this was used for torture on the most brutal prisoners. Miles replies, "That's exactly what that was." The doctors want Miles to go undercover for them and penetrate the State labs as he has no computer identity. Before he can be told much more, the police arrive and Miles escapes. He winds up posing as a butler robot, donning white face make-up and a piece of metal in his mouth. Miles becomes the servant of Luna (Diane Keaton), a poet who has some high class friends over for a party when Miles arrives for service. In a hilarious scene, Miles is asked to pass around "The Orb", a round ball that lets off a drug that produces a feeling of hysteria. After holding "The Orb" for too long, Miles becomes high himself and seduces one of the dinner guests. Luna takes Miles in to get fixed, and when he sees they are going to rip his head off escapes with Luna in tow. The rest of the film plays off of Miles and Luna hiding from the police. Miles is eventually captured, brainwashed and turned into a citizen with identity. In a journey into the bizarre, Woody places Miles into a Miss America contest in which he is the winner. Perhaps it was to make Miles feel more accepted? Luna eventually catches up with him and together are mistaken for important doctors. In one of the funniest scenes in the film, Miles and Luna must take the nose of a dead leader and clone a body out of it. The film ends with them falling in love and escaping from the fascist police state. A very happy ending to a very great film. Woody really unleashes his comical talents in this film. The sight gags are just as funny as the dialogue. Luna asks Miles, "What was it like to be frozen for 200 years?" Miles replies, "Like spending a weekend in Beverly Hills." He gives a performance that is almost comparable to Buster Keaton, Chaplain or Lloyd. In one sequence, he is hanging from a piece of tape on a tall building that is a direct homage to infamous scene with Lloyd hanging from the clock. Allen is much more like Lloyd in this picture as we quite often see Allen's facial expressions. Keaton and Chaplain were often straight faced during a gag, while Lloyd was more likely to give a little away the humor in his face. In many scenes where the police are chasing Miles and Luna, there is a Keystone Cops approach to their chasing style. When he is shaving in the mirror the reflected image of himself shaves in different strokes, giving the impression of a Marx Brother's skit. Diane Keaton and Woody Allen make a great comic team once again in this film. There are many times in the film where there is no dialogue, only the actions and reactions while a Dixieland jazz score plays over the scenes. To record the soundtrack, Woody went to New Orleans to record the soundtrack with the renowned Preservation Hall Jazz Band. The soundtrack to Sleeper is probably the best used and most effective in a Woody Allen film. Several songs are repeatedly used throughout the film, but not once does it hurt instead of help the comedy. The Dixieland jazz produces a very uplifting sound that worked far better than if Woody would have used Moog synthesizers for the typcial science ficition soundtrack sound. It makes the film unique in that it most likely is the only Science Fiction film to have a jazz score. In another interesting production note, Joel Schumacher was the costume designer for the film. The film resembles Bananas in that Fielding Mellish and Miles both were anti-heroes forced into becoming a leader. Miles had no choice in running from the police. He doesn't want to be the hero, and says at one point, "I'm not the heroic type. I was beaten up by Quakers." The theme of this character will also creep into the lead character in his next film Love and Death. To blend in, Woody must become someone else. In Sleeper he is the outsider, so he must dress as a Butler Robot to disguise himself. Also in Sleeper Woody has relied on other films for inspiration in set design and scene content. There are obvious references to Clockwork Orange in the design of the cities and Metropolis and 2001 in the labs. There is even a talking computer that is most likely related to HAL. The parodies of these film blend so smoothly into Sleeper that they become hardly a distraction at all. It does have that youthful quality to it that escapes from Woody Allen films down the road. |
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