Sleeper

A futuristic comedy from Woody Allen in 1973 has him waking up from an operation 200 years later (in 2173) to find society has gone berserk.

Clever, witty, and very funny. Allen is hysterically funny as the "sleeper" who gets to give history lessons on the 1970s, pose as a robot, and become a revolutionary to be near Diane Keaton.

Filled with sight gags galore and great one-liners. The giant vegetables and chicken are funny. And so is the "1984" political humor that fits the Bush era better than it did the Nixon era. Also very funny is Allen's extended Blanche du Bois speech.

Allen is excellent as is Keaton. John Beck plays a revolutionary. Mary Gregory is the doctor. George Furth is a party guest. Jackie Mason does the voice of the Jewish tailor.

A must see.

Sleeper is a comedy with one of the wittiest premises I've ever seen. It is a comedy about life in the 22nd century through a neurotic Jewish Brooklynite's cynical eyes. No matter how different things are in the future, his perspective doesn't change, his wry sense of humor stays the same, happily misplaced ragtime music plays over the movie, and old-fashioned sight gags are employed complete with the occasional stepped-up film speed.

Allen has always done well playing virtually the same character in all of his movies, but his talent as an on screen comedian is milestoned in this performance. He has the brilliance to mock even the most elusive and unnoticed physical conventions of screen acting, for instance his whispering to Diane Keaton while they pose as doctors in the presence of several people close by. It's a nitpicky sense of humor that contributes greatly to the intelligence behind all of his manic goofiness.

Diane Keaton is his match, however, whereas most of his leading ladies usually aren't. In fact, I hold Diane Keaton's performance in Sleeper as her crowning achievement so far that I've seen of her, even beyond her work in the Godfather films. She delivers great laughs. Her highlight is in what is possibly the funniest scene in the entire film, which eventually involves her doing an impression of Marlon Brando. Who would think that Diane Keaton would deliver the most convincing and dead-on Brando impression one has ever seen. While we're on the subject of that particular part of that hysterical scene that I will preserve for you to see for yourself, I must say that most people, even some of the most talented comedians and office/class clowns can hardly come close to mimicking Brando's voice, expressions and mannerisms. Diane Keaton somehow nails it. In Sleeper, she gives one of the funniest performances I've ever seen from an actress. She and Allen are truly one of the funniest comic pairs I've ever seen in a movie.

What makes Sleeper so funny is not just the physical comedy but the out-of-the-box, completely unorthodox creativity behind all of the physical comedy. There is a scene where someone slips on a banana peel. But the banana peel is the size of a canoe, as is the banana and all of the electronically preserved fruits and vegetables in this particular place, and Allen is being chased by a futuristic cop and both of them are slipping repeatedly on the peel. The film has robot butlers and maids of the future, and gradually throughout the film some are introduced as robots programmed to act and speak like effeminate gay men and Brooklyn Jewish stereotypes. There is also a great amount of intellectualism and cultural knowledge in even the zaniest of humorous moments in Sleeper, and that is what makes it one of Woody Allen's funniest films and a work of true comic genius.

Sleeper was a very interesting project for Allen. He had spent time doing stand up, and up until this, his movies had been written around the jokes. With the exception of Play it Again, Sam, they were a series of sketches loosely tied into a weak plot. Sleeper was the beginning of the end of this. While the plot is somewhat "sit-com-ish", it was still there, and viewers always kept it in mind. It was also loose enough that Allen could incorporate scenes paying homage to the early silent film stars (the scene with the flying suits is my personal favorite). Miles Monroe was also a rip off from Bob Hope's cowardly hero personalities, but Allen gave it his own twist, and, in my opinion, made it much better. All in all, Allen achieved the perfect blend of slapstick and substance for those in need of a simple comedy. It lacks the depth of some of his better films, but if you want to laugh, this is for you.

Oh, and if you find it somewhat intellectually devoid, try Love and Death. It was his next film, and he added less slapstick and more highbrow comedy, as well as a little more real drama and substance.

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.

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").