Sleep

The movie, "Sleep," will begin with a Bible quote:

"Behold, I tell you a mystery; we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed; in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye..."

Corinthians, 15-51,52

I do not really have to tell you how ominous the music will be here.

It is Yale in 1955. A group of students have been assigned to a study that explore the effects of sleep deprivation on people. It is their sixth day without (or with little) sleep. One guy from the group suddenly stands up and goes to the bathroom. When he comes back, he has some kind of a rod he took out from one of the bathroom stalls. His friends ask, "What are you doing?" The guy starts hitting his friends with the rod, killing one and injuring 2 others before he is taken down by his friends.

Fast forward to today... Same university, same experiment, different time and people. A few days pass without any incident, then on the sixth day, some subjects begin exhibiting microsleep and hallucinations that strangely involve biblical situations. The experiment is stopped, in the fear that the subjects' health is in danger.

Our experimenter's name is Mike, he is trying to graduate with a Master's in Psychology. His advisor is an old professor, they picked Mike's thesis topic together.

Mike observes changes in some subjects' behavior after the experiment. They are edgier, they begin listening to Death Metal, and they meet secretly in their dorm's basement. One day, Mike follows them... He sees them sacrificing small animals.

And, there is a murder in the campus. One of the subjects goes to a bar, hooks up with his ex girlfriend with cunning eloquence, and ends up killing her during sex. Mike knows both of them; he is highly suspicious of the subject, but he cannot prove anything. There is an investigation, but the investigators seem to be incompetent, or they just don't care.

Mike is spooked. He does some more research on sleep deprivation studies and finds out about the experiment in 1955 in Yale's library. This event is only mentioned in an obscure local newspaper. His professor is one of the subjects!

He snoops on his friends one more time, and sees his professor with them. This time, he is quickly discovered and tied down by them.

"You cannot get away with this!", Mike shouts. His professor is calm, however.

"Sleeplessness is a gateway to my master", the professor explains. "In 1955, an experiment opened a door for me and showed me how great my master was."

Mike: "You cannot kill me, you will be found out! I will go to the highest authority for this!"

"Good luck with that!", the professor tells him. "Do you know why Skull and Bones requires its members to go sleepless for 6 days?"

"You mean, the organization that produced..."

"Yes, many of our presidents! It would be great if I showed you a few slides of mushroom clouds now, wouldn't it?", the professor chuckles.

Mike: "But, what about all the Satanists that are caught by the police?"

Professor: "Yes, what about THEM? They are a bunch of wannabes; losers and freaks who don't even worship our Master in a real way... I bet they haven't been sleepless for more than a day in their entire life."

At the end, Mike is let go. He cannot harm them. In fact, nobody really can.

The Pianist

The difference between "The Pianist" and "Schindler's List" is like the difference between an Aston Martin and a Kia. In other words, there is no comparison. The Pianist has character development, and Schindler's List has character butchering. I remember saying, "Why did this Schindler guy have a change of heart all of a sudden? Did I miss a scene, did I fall asleep?" (Neither of which would have surprised me.)

Hmmmm, the director who made "Rosemary's Baby", and the director who made a movie about dinosaur eggs - you decide.

Also, what is up with talented Jewish directors (Allen, Polanski) and younger women? According to this rule, I can assure you, you will never hear Spielberg's name in a scandal involving a young woman.