Waking Life

Incredibly origional, beautiful and perhaps even autistic.

There is no plot if you do not take meaning to words. However, to accompany the thought of the film is the visual representation as to what is being spoken of. The film was shot with a HomeVideo camera and then drawn/colored over.

The animation adds personality and independence to each character, moment,

scene. It is certainly not made for the Mtv generation (or degeneration) nor is its purpose lucid enough to summerize into a music video or column. Reccomended to anyone who takes any interest in philosophy, psychology, or film. Anyone serious to any of those fields is subtly handicap if not having seen it.

This film, if seen by someone who has DEEPLY considered the mysteries of life, will thoroughly delight. If you don't have a spiritual bone in your body, avoid. It has its flaws, but only in retrospect or through the eyes of another will they be found--and then forgiven if you have even an ounce of heart or a particle of transcendence.

It gets beneath one's radar and past one's filters.

For instance, it hits you perceptually with constantly varying animation styles, and after some time, you adjust to this so much that when you leave the theater, THE WORLD IS ANIMATED--a poetic way of saying that your connection to the proposition that all things are real is loosen WONDERFULLY!

And then, it hits you intellectually by parading a dozen+ viewpoints of persons who would not necessarily disagree with one another, but show the vast importance to us of the personal way we manifest our philosophical axioms and how much that depends on our individual interests-not all of us are psychologically constructed to be philosophers, but all of us can be analyzed to have a philosophical set of suppositions. Waking Life challenges these suppositions by merely presenting to you, in dramatic form, persons who vividly present their `takes' on the concepts and how they are impacted by them...especially emotionally.

Ultimately, this is not a movie, and it shouldn't be viewed as such; instead, one should approach it as therapy. See it, be with it, relax, and GROW. Every time you see it again, the concepts saturate your nervous system with reinforcing patterns that will later "echo" in your dynamics in synergistic ways. A seed gets planted and with repeated viewings the seed gets watered.

Go to this event. See it from a seat that's within the first ten rows of the theater; immerse yourself. Let go. All you have to lose (loosen) is identification with a reflection of the real you.

Sitting in the movie theater, I found that I was wishing for a remote control to pause the film every minute or so and think about what I'd just heard. The movie shows a sequence of characters in a dream rattling off their theories on life with almost no space between, and I found myself confused many times, struggling with transfering from one topic to another.

I'll need to see this movie another seven times to understand everything that was said.... or wait for the video?

Okay, i haven't read any comments yet, but a lot of the "one line summaries" sound negative. I just finished watching this film, and registered an account with IMDb solely to speak of this film. These are the types of movies that we should be expecting from filmmakers today. Aren't we all tired of the blockbuster bullshit by now? True, it's not a "typical movie" and yes...it is a cartoon. But, the style is completely unique and entirely necessary for the story. If it were simply caught on film and released in that same manor, it would not have had the monstrous effect that it had, and it would not have come across in a way that would retain the interest of this generation's ADD youth (which SHOULD be it's primary demographic...they are the ones who can still change this world, and create the paradigm shift that is necessary) This movie is the fiber of all life, it IS that collective unconscious from which we all draw our own, personal beings. It explains the philosophies of years gone by and minutes gone by in a way that anyone could understand them. While I know that some closed minded people are going to be scared and confused by all of this necessary information, if only one mind is opened because of it, I know that Richard Linklater would be greatly pleased.

Waking Life is probably one of the most randomly amazing works that I have seen. It's lack of a plot, random events, and constant motion give it the dreamlike feel. The ideas are all so intriguing that I don't understand how anyone can hate this movie. I can understand that it could be hard to sit through if you're tired, or if you refuse to contemplate the endless possibilities presented. I'll also admit that some people would find it very hard to watch the animation, but to me it keeps your attention. I tried to imagine what this movie would have been like if it hadn't been animated and I don't think it would have had the impact on as many people as it has if it weren't for the animation. I think that anyone who enjoys the topic of dreams would find it worthwhile. I could watch this movie over and over and still find something that I hadn't noticed before. If you don't like movies that make you think, don't watch it. But if you want a movie that gives you a lot of things to think about and allows you the freedom to interpret it in many different ways . . . check it out!