Sleeping Beauty [MA]

Quietly reckless and death-haunted university student, Lucy, takes a job as a Sleeping Beauty. In the Sleeping Beauty Chamber, old men seek erotic thrills that require Lucy’s submission. This unsettling task soon begins to bleed into Lucy’s life and she develops an increasing need to know what happens to her in those hours when she’s asleep. 

I have a bit of an admiration for Emily Browning, probably because a) she’s just beautiful, and b) she’s an Aussie. So I hired this smaller, more artistic and provocative title for no other reason than that she was in it. I have to say that I don’t think I entirely understood what the film was about. In its entirety, it’s very subtle and suggestive, with a haze of characters and vague erotic fancies. I’m in two minds about whether I liked it or not. 

Quietly reckless and death-haunted university student, Lucy, takes a job as a Sleeping Beauty. In the Sleeping Beauty Chamber, old men seek erotic thrills that require Lucy’s complete submission. This unsettling task soon begins to bleed into Lucy’s life when she’s awake and she develops an increasing need to know that happens to her in those hours when she’s asleep. 

Everything about this film was downplayed and incredibly subtle. In a way, the film is rather evasive as scenes are brought to a dignified close with a simple, yet somewhat unnerving fadeout. 

The script, though it does use some brazen and harder dialogue, is rather subdued with each character avoiding stating the simple and answering the ultimate question: “what’s going on?” Looking at it in this way, the film was rather like a game of ring-around-the-rosy, with the story and the characters dancing in a vague circle around a few central themes and questions that the movie puts forward. 

The film does pose a few questions about life, death, and enjoyment, but these are just as hazy and hard to grasp as the characters and the general direction of the film. 

Emily Browning was captivating as Lucy, delivering a subtle performance, aside from the penultimate climax before the credits roll. I think she was perfect for the role because she has a real sense of beauty and purity about her, almost like Snow White, even though her character is anything but pure. She did well. 

Starring Rachel Blake, Chris Haywood, Peter Carroll, and Ewan Leslie, Sleeping Beauty was a subtle yet interesting film that was filled with sex, drugs, sleep, eroticism, and a real sense of foreboding melancholy. I may need to see it a second time to get a bit more out of it because, despite its vague and evasive atmosphere, I feel that it does harbour a lot of something beneath the surface.