Review #25 | "Winter Sleepers" (1997)

"Winter Sleepers" is a psychological drama that centers around the events that like together the lives of 5 people: Rene, Laura, Rebekah, Marco, and Theo. Using color as a mean of defining characters, this film looks at the relationships between these people as ways of showing off the different aspects of humanity within each of them.

This film is international, hailing from Germany. The date of release and the international flair of the film doesn't quite appeal to the modern conventions of filmmaking we are used to, yet it lingers with questions that have made every person throughout time stop and think: Who am I? What does my life mean? What do other people think of me? Am I good enough? What am I doing wrong? Am I happy? The usual...

Discontinuity of time drives some aspects of the film in a lazy haze. In the beginning, we are given a tour of life during hibernation. Sleeping. Not getting anything done - it is the holiday season after all. The ending of the film is a sequence of awakening - lives move on, for better or for worse, and the Sleep is over; it is okay to be awake.

Many viewers can see different parts of themselves in one or more characters. Each character has defining characteristics that have the potential to drive the story in more than one way at a time. "Winter Sleepers" keeps some audiences engaged by not knowing how the plot will unfold next. Others will be detered by the slow pace and lack of clear storyline. Either way, the movie lingers in thought and reveals itself with age.

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Rated R.

Directed by Tom Tywker. Starring Ulrich Matthes, Marie-Lou Sellem, Floraine Daniel, Heino Ferch, and Josef Bierbichler.