SLEEPLESS

Italy, 2000, 117 minutes, Colour.
Max von Sydow, Stefano Dionisi, Chiara Casselli.
Directed by Dario Argento.

Sleepless is a film by Dario Argento, the master of slasher horror movies over many decades, beginning in the '60s and '70s with films like Along Came a Spider and The Bird with the Crystal Plumage. During the '70s and '80s he had cult status in Italy and in many countries around the world. However, while he continued to make films, he was not so popular in the '90s. Many people found his treatment too explicit, vivid and brutal. There are some of these characteristics in Sleepless. However, it is a conventional plot of a serial killer and a murder mystery. But, with some gory details in the showing of the victims, it is a typical Argento melodramatic and flamboyant thriller with Max von Sydow as a retired policeman, Stefano Dionisi as the grown-up victim of the serial killer. There are many twists and turns and overall it is a return to something of form by Argento, as well as enabling him to reach a world-wide audience.

1. The popularity of the serial killer movies? The slasher movies? Murder mysteries?

2. The Turin settings: 1983, the gruesomeness of the murder, the investigations? 2000 and the murder of the prostitute after her being with the killer, his room, in bed, his childish behaviour, his file? The phone call? Terror on the train and the girl running backwards and forwards in the empty train, the death of the conductor? Her friend, meeting the train, the rain, murdered in the car park? The beginning of the new investigation?

3. Ulysses as chief inspector, his promise to Giacomo in 1983, his retirement, his lapses of memory? His interest in the case, investigations, the resentment of the official, his working the clues, working with Giacomo? His changing his opinion, the theory about the dwarf, the mother and the revelation about the children's books, the further investigations, the further murders, his getting closer? The dwarf and his shooting, his heart attack and death? Max von Sydow giving some dignity to the proceedings? (And, while others were dubbed, the benefit of his using his own voice.)

4. Giacomo and the memories of his mother's death, their recurrence? Work in Rome, leaving the restaurant, coming to visit Lorenzo, their friendships, the various friends, especially Gloria and Fausto? At the restaurant, the poisoned drink and Lorenzo being ill? The meeting with Ulysses, their working together, visiting the house, the various murders, the car park attendant? The growing danger? Gloria and the Swan Lake recital? His fear for her? Gradually coming to the truth? Pursuing Leone? The house, the confrontation with the lawyer, the truth about Lorenzo and the confrontation?

5. Lorenzo, his friendship, the story of his past, education abroad? Inviting Giacomo to Turin? The poison? The support? The revelation of the truth? His father, the sinister presence? His finally being at the house, his shooting, his killing himself? Protecting his son?

6. Leone in the house, the dwarf? The singing of the rhyme? Giacomo and Gloria following him, his death? His role in the proceedings?

7. The dwarf himself, his writing, his books being used, the influence on the young Lorenzo? His mother and her grief, her having killed her son? His body being snatched? The innocent victim?

8. The police, their investigations? The murders on the train, the murder in the car park, the dwarf's mother, Leone? The death of Ulysses?

9. The presentation of the killings: gory and brutal? Gratuitous? Appropriate? The audience for this kind of slasher thriller mystery?