Light Sleeper (1992)

A drug dealer reconsiders his profession when his boss plans to go straight and an old flame reappears.

Director:

Paul Schrader

Writer:

Paul Schrader

Stars:

Willem Dafoe, Susan Sarandon, Dana Delany

1 win & 6 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Willem Dafoe	...	John LeTour
Susan Sarandon	...	Ann
Dana Delany	...	Marianne
David Clennon	...	Robert
Mary Beth Hurt	...	Teresa
Victor Garber	...	Tis
Jane Adams	...	Randi
Paul Jabara	...	Eddie
Robert Cicchini	...	Guidone
Sam Rockwell	...	Jealous
Rene Rivera	...	Manuel
David Spade	...	Theological Cokehead
Steven Posen	...	Hasid
Ken Ladd	...	Carlos
Brian Judge	...	Thomas

Storyline

A drug dealer with upscale clientele is having moral problems going about his daily deliveries. A reformed addict, he has never gotten over the wife that left him, and the couple that use him for deliveries worry about his mental well-being and his effectiveness at his job. Meanwhile someone is killing women in apparently drug-related incidents.

---

Plot Keywords:

female frontal nudity | male nudity | jail | shootout | hotel | 

---

Taglines:

He was a good man in a deadly business. She was his only way out.

---

Genres:

Crime | Drama

---

Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for strong language and drug content, and for violence and a scene of sensuality

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

13 March 1992 (UK)

Also Known As:

Könnyű altató

Filming Locations:

USA

Box Office

Budget:

$5,000,000 (estimated)

Gross USA:

$1,050,861

Company Credits

Production Co:

Carolco Pictures,Grain of Sand Productions,Live Entertainment

Technical Specs

Runtime:

103 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Director Paul Schrader actually sent Willem Dafoe out to observe deals with a real drug dealer as training for this role. When Schrader asked Dafoe if anybody recognized him, Dafoe said he believed some did, but that they were afraid they would not get their drugs if they said anything.

---

Quotes

Marianne: I envy you. Convenient memory is a gift from God.

---

Connections

References Pickpocket (1959)

---

Soundtracks

To Feel This Way
(Michael Been)
Performed by The Call

User Reviews

Working out of karma

With Schrader it always comes back to this. Lonely nights and aimless wandering, always just a step short of being swallowed up in the abyss. But it's always the worst at the brink, where guilt starts eating up inside.

So a jazz ballad about lonely nights, this is what people probably call noir in this. About a man who has come a long, painful way to get nowhere, is tired and looking for his harbor. He's a drug dealer, so we get the awkward encounters in seemy places and travel through other people on the same way down as he has been before.

Sarandon is radiant, fierce but fragile, but this is Dafoe's show, it wouldn't have been the same without Dafoe. He's right inside the character, where the desperation piles up. See how his face lights up when Sarandon invites him to lunch, how he passes through peoples' lives without staying, as though time is running out.

Two instances reveal the betrayal (one involving sex and a madonna painting), both involving mirrors that lie. The reflections reveal people who don't have time to get involved, how everyone's strange when you're a stranger. See if you can spot them out.

It is ultimately about the working out of karma, and how our present hells have been long in the digging. Eventually he has to atone with the one thing he's running out of and can't spare, time.