The Sleepwalker (2014)

Directed by: Mona Fastvold
Country: Norway / USA

Movie Review: “The Sleepwalker” is a Norwegian/American dramatic exercise, a result from the collaboration of Norwegian actress-turned-writer/director (for the first time), Mona Fastvold, with the American actor Brady Corbet who also co-wrote. The story follows a young couple, Kaia (Gitte Witt) and Andrew (Christopher Abbott) who unexpectedly see their lives agitated by the arrival of Kaia’s unbalanced sister Christine (Stephanie Ellis), and later by her fiancé Ira (Corbet), the most interesting of the four unattractive characters. Mixing strong sexual components with the usual family quarrels, the film fails to convey the intended psychological factor that seeks from the first minute. The score, created by Fastvold’s husband, Sondre Lerche, enforces a floating ambiance instead of a tense one, while the dialogues fall many times in banal territory. Instead of provoking us and trying to mess with our heads, “The Sleepwalker” just numbs us with a hopping narrative, monotonous tones and a single-speed pace. Fastvold’s direction was fair yet unremarkable, while the performances were acceptable but whether through interactions or isolated actions, never helped to compose any decent whole picture. In the end, this ineffective drama doesn’t take us anywhere beyond an old, closed garage door. The film, a production from diversified media company, Tandem Pictures, competed in the US dramatic competition at Sundance.