| 91 |
The Onion (A.V. Club)
An indie version of Gondry's "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," albeit with none of the star power, a quarter of the budget, half the angst, and twice the charm.
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| 88 |
Premiere
It's not likely you'll see a film more visually exhilarating until, well, Gondry's next.
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| 88 |
TV Guide
Bernal continues to demonstrate an impressive range; the character requires the normally laid-back actor to be a wild ball of energy, and he's more than up to the challenge. His performance is hilarious, heartfelt and more than a little creepy, which could also be said about the movie itself.
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| 83 |
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
This scruffy, unkempt tale lacks the narrative satisfaction of Kaufman's dramatic design, but between the chaotic zigs and creative jags, it proclaims its own kind of messy authenticity and a bittersweet beauty.
|
| 83 |
Portland Oregonian
This fascinating and occasionally transporting film never quite transforms into something really great.
|
| 83 |
Christian Science Monitor
Very difficult to characterize and that's why I like it. The best I can do is to call it a sunny tragedy.
|
| 80 |
Los Angeles Times
It's rare for young actors to exude as much charisma and charm as Gainsbourg and García Bernal.
|
| 80 |
Slate
Dana Stevens
To me, the movie feels like a small but ingeniously crafted gift.
|
| 80 |
Film Threat
Sally Foster
The Science of Sleep truly has to be seen to be believed.
|
| 80 |
Village Voice
Sweet, crazy, and tinged with sadness, Michel Gondry's new feature The Science of Sleep is a wondrous concoction.
|
| 80 |
LA Weekly
For the soul of Gondry's work, it seems to me, is neither its soaring flights of visual fancy nor its sometimes crude slapstick, but rather its pained understanding of a generation hopelessly tongue-tied when it comes to matters of the heart.
|
| 80 |
Salon.com
No one who sees it will confuse it with anything else. Fans of Gondry's DIY low-tech aesthetic, which he blends, as always, with exceptionally sophisticated animation techniques, will adore it.
|
| 80 |
Chicago Reader
Gondry is a soft surrealist without much of a sociopolitical agenda, closer to Dr. Seuss than Luis Buñuel,
|
| 80 |
Empire
Oliver Richards
It suffers occasionally from self-consciousness and over-indulgence in its own oddity, but Gondry’s grasp of emotion and visuals is enchanting. Even if he seems several sandwiches short of a picnic.
|
| 80 |
Washington Post
Never intends to be deeper than a magician's hat, and its wonderfully low-tech stop-motion technique is not only a nod to Czech animator Jan Svankmajer but a tacit rebuke to computer-graphics-heavy fantasies such as "The Chronicles of Narnia" or the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy.
|
| 78 |
Austin Chronicle
I think it's a mess, but - and this is a major caveat - an endearing, beautiful, hopelessly honest mess that's supported by a pair of performances so unnaturally natural that they draw you in and clutch you, struggling, to their flipping, flopping hearts.
|
| 75 |
Boston Globe
This pop-up book of a film is an ideal arrangement between director and star.
|
| 75 |
San Francisco Chronicle
The title is all that's boring about director Michel Gondry's latest mind bender, as trippy as LSD.
|
| 75 |
USA Today
The look of the film is dazzling, even hallucinatory, and the concept is beyond quirky as conceived by Gondry, a talented visual stylist, in his first film based on his own script. The story is compelling, unconventional and diverting in its blurring of reality and fantasy.
|
| 75 |
Philadelphia Inquirer
Unlike Gondry's previous features, Human Nature and Eternal Sunshine, Science lacks the sturdy armature of a Charlie Kaufman screenplay to support its eccentricities. The flood of delight in the film's first 90 minutes slowed to a trickle and, finally, a drip.
|
| 75 |
Chicago Tribune
It only works about half the time, but it's an interesting half.
|
| 75 |
Rolling Stone
Fusing animation and live action with a series of outrageous props, Gondry veers dangerously close to being precious. But make no mistake: Gondry's hallucinatory brilliance holds you in thrall.
|
| 70 |
The New York Times
So while The Science of Sleep may not, in the end, be terribly deep, it is undoubtedly -- and deeply -- refreshing.
|
| 70 |
Variety
With Mexican star Gael Garcia Bernal energetically playing a vulnerable graphic artist with a hyperactive imagination and little confidence with women, picture has an overriding quality of sweetness that will prove endearing to audiences, especially younger females.
|
| 67 |
Entertainment Weekly
The Science of Sleep is like a weird dream that tugs at the memory throughout the day with its intriguing, misshapen pieces.
|
| 63 |
New York Daily News
The result is a charming, inventive, ambitious, surreal mess.
|
| 63 |
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Jason McBride
It's this edge that saves The Science of Sleep from its own whimsy.
|
| 63 |
New York Post
Watching it is like being the only non-stoned person in the room as someone tells a long, long story.
|
| 50 |
Miami Herald
Certainly pleasant, and occasionally endearing, but it's also strangely empty and unsatisfying, like hearing about someone else's wild dream: You can appreciate the details, but you don't really care how it turns out.
|
| 50 |
ReelViews
What "Eternal Sunshine" did with magic and whimsy, The Science of Sleep accomplishes with confusion and pretentiousness.
|
| 50 |
The New Yorker
A frantic and funny diversion, but it pales and tires before its time is up. It doesn't know the meaning of enough.
|
| 50 |
New York Magazine
The Science of Sleep transports you, but it strands you, too. Apart from the time-machine bit and two or three other daft exchanges, Gondry’s scenes tend to circle around the same drain: the hero’s insufferable narcissism.
|
| 25 |
Baltimore Sun
You have to identify pretty strongly with suffering artistes to find anything to root for in The Science of Sleep.
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