Sleeper

Slapstick combined with razor sharp dialogue. The film is pure magic, its my favourite comedy and I think it is in my top three Allen films of all time. See it if you like the Marx brothers, Woody is all of them rolled into one in this film, it's utter genius. Woody also plays the jazz music which scores the film, and you know you're in for a treat when hearing the first few bars makes you smile. There aren't many comedies out there which could top this in terms of low budget, gags-per-second ratio, music, and sheer quality. If a film could save your life (as in Hannah and her sisters), it's this one.

In this early Woody, most of his shtick is already in evidence. And, for quite a while, the jokes are funny. But after a while, the jokes start repeating and the film just lies there, a noisy unwieldy mess with Woody and Diane arguing repeatedly and noisily. It seems to me that Woody here is rather strongly influenced by Chaplin's "Modern Times" which I'm also not a fan of. But Chaplin had an undeniable gift for physical humor which Woody does not. Later on, Woody became more pretentious in an effort to be profound, especially when he was trying to channel Bergman. I have found it typical of all the Woodies I've seen more than once, that I can't really watch it again. If you think I'm not a fan, you are right! 6 out of 10.

Woody Allen is such a staple of New York and city-living that it's a hoot to see him at the center of the far-out futuristic surroundings in "Sleeper". His nuttiness isn't tempered by the visual gimmicks, and the movie is both recklessly daffy and wonderful to look at (it's great eye-candy, one of his best designed pictures). Allen's screenplay, co-written with Marshall Brickman, about an ulcerous health food fanatic frozen in 1973 and thawed out 200 years later, is a doodle that desperately has to work up new subplots just to keep going, and the entire brainwashing thread is wearing (although it does allow Diane Keaton to do an impersonation of Brando which is very funny). The film is decidedly shrill, and the neurotic one-liners (mostly about sex) seem to come from nowhere. Still, the movie has a lunatic decadence to it, and a kind of nostalgic abandon, which makes it both silly and edgy at the same time. *** from ****

I think I am going to have to rank this as Woody Allen's second-best (and second-funniest) movie... after the unbeatable "Annie Hall". Even after having seen the movie 3 or 4 times I still find myself amused by some of Allen's shtick... and his rarely-demonstrated adeptness at physical comedy. So many classic physical bits: riding around in the wheelchair... eating the rubber glove... the future scientists trying to force his slack body into a futuristic vehicle. After this movie Woody started to get a little too cerebral... this was his last attempt at a just-plain-funny movie... and probably his most satisfying of his early comedies... only because there was a sort-of storyline. Woody is cryogenically frozen after a botched operation in the 1970s and is awoken 200 years later to find himself in a repressive Orwellian future. He meets up with a spoiled rich chick (Diane Keaton) and influences her (not really intentionally) into becoming a revolutionary activist.

No question that Woody Allen's earliest films were the most unpretentiously humorous, and Sleeper stands out among them. The conception of a frozen Allen waking up centuries in the future allows for plenty of biting satire on America in the 70's, not that we don't have plenty of good old-fashioned slapstick to boot. The bit with the Jewish robot tailors knocks me out no matter how many times I see it ("o-KAY, ve'll take it IN").

We are blessed that Woody was around, making movies as interesting as this when he was. Already with this one, he began his vast exploration of movie techniques and devices that would last 25 years or so. The idea is simple in this one: he wanted to use film slapstick from a bygone era. How better to situate that than to move the whole picture into a future era? We have some truly classic stuff here. The banana joke, The mirror joke. The robot pantomime. The acting out of the Jewish dinner (done in later movies too). The inflated man joke. You can find all these in any number of Keaton. Marx, Laurel & Hardy movies. The unifying string of time travel, a romance, the leader and his nose is too weak to make this a solidly recommended outing. And it wouldn't be for a couple years until Woody cared about the cinematography at all. I had forgotten how pretty Diane Keaton was. Very. Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.

Woody Allen's previous efforts, BANANAS and TAKE THE MONEY AND RUN, were exceptionally funny but very uneven films. His being a bit of an amateur in the film business is pretty obvious in these movies. However, by the time he created SLEEPER, he was a lot more polished and consistent film maker. While this is still a very stupid and sophomoric film, it is very funny nevertheless. While there are occasionally bad moments (such as the giant chicken), they are very few and the humor just keeps hitting you again and again. I particularly liked the Orgazmatron and the history lesson he gives the futuristic professors. This film is slapstick and dopey--exactly the type of film that intellectuals (the audience for most later Allen films) will probably hate. This is Allen for the common man--back when he used to be very funny.