REVIEWS The Other Side Of Sleep REVIEWED BY FIONNUALA HALLIGAN
With Irish accents so strong they need subtitles, Rebecca Daly’s Offaly villagers are palpably real; her dreamy story ebbs and flows around them as a psychologically frail young girl draws herself into the aftermath of a disturbing murder. A Cannes Residence project, The Other Side Of
Sleep is undeniably Irish but speaks the film lan- guage of the European arthouse. It should make an immediate impression, notching strong sales for Paris-based Memento Films (its closest relation is Urszula Antoniak’s Nothing Personal). Daly’s haunting debut flirts with dreams and real-
ity; it is understated yet powerfully etched. Though it cannot quite maintain the force of its opening sequences and the elliptical narrative sometimes takes a turn into muddy waters, The Other Side Of Sleep is a notable debut with a lead performance which marks out young AntoniaCampbell-Hughes as a talent to watch. Daly’s work with photographer Suzie Lavelle and her sound team of Michel Schöp- ping and Marc Lizier isnotable throughout. Arlene (Campbell-Hughes) is a sleepwalker since
childhood, a lonely and vulnerable orphan living by herself in a downbeat Offaly village (this is not an Irish tourist board destination) with occasional visits from her grandmother. None of this is apparent in the memorable
DIRECTORS’ FORTNIGHT
Ire-Neth-Hun. 2011. 88mins Director Rebecca Daly Production company Fastnet Films International sales Memento Films International, www.
memento-films.com Producers Morgan Bushe, Macdara Kelleher Co-producers Ivo de Jongh, Reinier Selen Screenplay Rebecca Daly, Glenn Montgomery Cinematography Suzie Lavelle Editor Halina Daugrid Main cast Antonia Campbell-Hughes, Sam Keeley, Vicky Joyce, Olwen Fouere, Finian Robbins, Cathy Belton
BREAKINGNEWS For the latest film business news see
ScreenDaily.com
opening sequence, when she wakes up beside a dead body wrapped in a duvet in the woods. A fac- tory worker, she leaves the scene, comes home and showers, then goes straight to work. Arlene lives in a silent, internalised world; a
friend jokes that people think she is a little mad. The murder of her mother in England when she was an infant has left her cautious and alienated, yet some- how she has a need to reach out to the dead girl. Villagers gossip about what might have happened, denigrating the victim and pointing the finger at her wild boyfriend (Keeley).
In the meantime, Arlene’s sleepwalking — and
her terror of it — is intensifying, exacerbated by the trauma of waking up beside a corpse (though it seems odd that in such a small town her neigh- bours would not be more aware of Arlene’s noctur- nal ramblings). Arlene at times looks as if she is dangerously
close to joining cinema’s long line of blank young girls, but Daly and her co-writer Glenn Mont- gomery have worked hard with Campbell-Hughes to give us the feeling there is more to her than meets the eye.
Film London
Supports over 1,000 film, TV and advertising projects every year. Make us your first point of contact for filming in the capital.
www.filmlondon.org.uk
n 22 Screen International at the Cannes Film Festival May 16, 2011
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68