La chica de mis sueños

The Good Night (2007)

Gwyneth's brother directs a curious but strained movie featuring both Gwyneth Paltrow as the real world lead and Penelope Cruz as some kind of vixen of the lead men's dreams. Now you might wonder what leading man Martin Freeman has wrong with him that he gets to sleep with his wife, played by Gwyneth, and yet he dreams of this other, Latina, woman. This is so filled with simplistic male fantasy, with stereotypes of ethnic types and gender roles, it's sometimes painful.

Most of the time you can, hopefully, gloss over this and see pure cleverness (in the footsteps of The Science of Sleep 2006) and layers of reality (a pale version of any Kaufman film like Eternal Sunshine (2004) or the more recent Synecdoche, New York). In fact, you might see the use of the woman's face in advertising as an echo of Red (1994). I guess I'm struggling to find the originality here, which I'm sure is meant to hold it all together.

Martin Freeman is likable but a little milquetoast for me, as the locus of the whole movie. Cruz is a relief in leather (the white fur on the beach scenes are total gag me clichés, even as clichéd dreams). I rather like Paltrow the sister as an actress when she is the normal young woman, which she is, but it does force the script to rise up and make their normal coupleness vivid, or trenchant, or comic. It is only slightly two of these. The fourth main character in spurts, besides the caricature that is Danny DeVito, is Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead fame), who is really a great presence, stealing his scenes.

Do I say see this movie? Only if there are some aspects here, and some influences, that are up your alley. It's not horrible at all, a kind of back-handed something to say without just saying it tries too hard.

There's something about dreams that requires relaxation and patience. They have a certain fluidity about them that if they're hurried or rushed they just aren't as effective. As is fitting for a film about dreams, "The Good Night" works because of good acting and gentle pacing. The result is one of those good old fashioned dark comedies that walks the line between drama and dark humor.

Martin Freeman is one of these actors that takes grips on the "average guy" role and has as much fun as he can with it. As Gary, the band member turned commercial music composer, he is effective in demonstrating his lack of joy in his current relationship with Dora (Gwyneth Paltrow) and sinking into obsessive dreams about the make believe Anna (Penelope Cruz). Freeman is always a good lead because no matter what he does, he's likable and we're always rooting him on, even as Dora calls him a jerk and she's probably right at one point.

But a lot of the humor in the film comes from the supporting players. Simon Pegg is always a no brainer for comedy because of his spot on delivery. As Gary's friend and boss, Paul, he jumps into the role of the somewhat amoral friend with his own relationship problems. However, he does still listen to Gary and even takes joy in some of his obsessiveness.

Then there's Danny Devito, playing the typical Danny Devito character as he hosts a dream support group but works odd jobs and hasn't had a relationship of his own for over 40 years. Despite all this, he still hears Gary out and Gary takes a lot of his advice. Devito has a lot of good one liners and a very funny introduction scene.

As to the movie as a whole, it's good but not great. Definitely worth a look. Part of me saw this as a dark comedy going through the motions and becoming very predictable as we got closer to the end. The premise was very fresh though and director Jake Paltrow really seizes the opportunity of capturing the dreamlike quality of some of the scenes. The performances and well paced direction really glue the movie together though, and at 90 minutes, it's not a bad movie to give a watch.

The idea is interesting enough. A musician in his thirties suffers from a major dip in his career and his relationship. But instead of addressing these problems, and have a serious talk with his girlfriend, the main character is more interested in explaining his childish dreams of a hot brunette. I didn't feel gripped for one minute by the story. And at the end, we are supposed to believe that Gary has surmounted his problems because the dreamgirl has said she for one believes in him. He composes a piano tune, gets one more chance from his girlfriend, and that's that. By the way, why has Paltrow used the documentary form? Was there anything to make a documentary about? The guy broke his leg, for heaven's sake. That's not to say there's nothing enjoyable about this film, but it's very little. It's okay if director's debut doesn't smash box office records or win three Palms in Venice. But Paltrow should dig deeper into his subject before making any other movie at all. No matter how good your cast is (and it's pretty decent), without good ideas, any film is bound to disappoint.

It is probably wise to take it easy on first venture by writer/director personas who probably would not have had their initial film see the light of day (or dark of theater) were it not for the connections of a famous show biz family. But Jake Paltrow did indeed achieve this goal so with the idea in mind that this is an initial outing so its best to look for the reasons this little film works and the reasons it could be better.

Gary Shaller (Martin Freeman) is an artist on the skids: he has a history of being a successful songwriter/musician but now is woefully stuck writing asinine jingles for second rate TV shows. His home life is no better as his wife Dora (Gweneth Paltrow) is a nagging discontent whiner. And he is now thirty-four years old with little hope for change. All of this is brought into clear focus by the quite opposite life of his best friend Paul (Simon Pegg) who seems to have it all right. Gary encounters dream whisperer Mel (Danny DeVito) who introduces him to Lucid Dreaming - and Gary somnolently discovers the beautiful, smart, sexy Anna (Penelope Cruz), the woman of his 'dreams' who crosses over being imagined and being real - and who adores Gary. And this discovery and the manner in which Gary deals with it forms the solution of the story.

The idea of lucid dreaming has been used before (Inception, The Science of Sleep, Eternal Sunshine, etc), but the concept is strong enough that Jake Paltrow's offering of his version is not a problem. Many parts of the film are sweet, but in general it drags and refuses to flesh out the characters enough to make us really care. But as a story about choosing between dream life and real life, a bit of Shakespeare would help: 'We are such stuff as dreams are made on; and our little life is rounded with a sleep.'

Grady Harp

Making a movie about dreams or dreaming is tough, and it shows in this one. The difficulty with dreams in any bit of fiction is that they can't be held accountable; that is, by definition, there isn't any kind of direct correspondence between dream occurrences and narrative significance. A dream (singular) here and there can enrich a narrative with symbolism, causality, subconscious, but when the dream becomes plural then almost universally a story starts to break down. Having gritted my teeth through movies like Waking Life and The Cell, to name a few, I've come to associate "dream" with "lazy" in cinema.

That being said, I had to see what Simon Pegg and Martin Freeman would do in a movie together. And the bottom line is, due to these two guys, the movie is worth a watch. Don't may more than $4 to see it.

What you get really is a movie without consequences. You have Martin Freeman obsessed with a dream character. OK, kind of interesting, but there's not enough dimension to his girlfriend (Paltrow), who just seems like a nag, or his friend/former bandmate (Pegg), who, granted, is extremely funny but ultimately without Pathos, to really make his dream obsession a truly engrossing psychological/sociological study.

And again, what happens here is that the dream sequences, and even the obsession with them, because of the, by definition, incommensurable quality of dreams, their inability to be authentically expressed through proxy (language, film, journals, etc.), leave us as audience members bereft of any feeling of causality, arc, or direction.

Also, as a sidenote, the pseudo-documentary format that the film opens with and halfheartedly maintains is confusing and ultimately misdirecting. It ends up looking like the mistake of a novice director.

Martin Freeman performs his lines well, Pegg is funny, DeVito is a pleasing eccentric, and Paltrow isn't as annoying as she usually is (however Cruz is somewhat intolerable), so the movie is worth seeing once, if you've got nothing better to do.