Richard Linklater
Waking Life

"To be healthy is a kind of madness used for just purposes; a waking life is a controlled dream" - (George Santayana).

Sometimes writing a review of an album or a film can be as useful as not writing it at all.

Honestly, I won't hide that engaging in the analysis of a work like this is for me an act of pure lust taken as a challenge, but by no means simple. For those who haven't yet seen "Waking Life," my advice is not to waste time on a cheap review like the following and to make amends. Naturally, anyone interested in discussing it can wander over here; you will be welcome.

Let's start from the beginning:

Richard Linklater, an interesting and eccentric director, decided to exploit the spirit contained in the previous quote and brought to life in 2001 an extraordinarily content-rich work titled "Waking Life".

This film has two main facets: firstly, it was made with a very particular technique. The entire film was shot with digital video support, on which a team of artists subsequently worked (via computer) by refining each frame with drawings and colors, thus giving the film an "illustrated" effect. This technique is called Rotoshop and was also used for another Linklater film, "A Scanner Darkly".

Unlike "A Scanner Darkly," where the technique is more precise with the protagonist's figures almost traced, in "Waking Life" it is intentionally used in a more ambiguous, almost approximate manner at times, as if to emphasize the rarefied atmosphere and elusive, non-perspective reality of dreams. The second important facet is precisely the content. As will be subtly emphasized by one of the characters that the protagonist (played by Wiley Wiggins) encounters, the film in itself doesn't have a real plot but unfolds in a series of situations, circumstances, and particular encounters that involve the young protagonist, with a common background of this conscious dreaming in which he is enveloped and which, incredulously, he cannot disentangle himself from. The conscious dream is a dreamlike state in which the dreamer becomes aware of dreaming, thus acquiring a control that allows him to participate actively and to concretely access the reality of the dream.

Particular attention should be paid to the conversations held during these unusual encounters, in which various delicate themes are addressed; in the context of a dream dimension that is impalpable and changeable, the extraordinariness of human potential, veiled and annihilated by irritating and depressing everyday life, is celebrated. The key to reading this constricting vision is linked to the fundamental way of approaching an infinitely rich and lively reality, and to the potential awareness of that spark of wonder and sacredness that lies dormant in every nuance of our lives.

Man, brutalized by a social context that he himself has created, defined, and perfected to impose order and sequence on his life, gives birth to his "time", sets his rhythms. An unconscious link in an undefined chain that twists upon itself, he perceives a strong "tension", born of the contrast (sometimes clear, sometimes more subtle) between his intrinsic nature and the powerful aberrations that surround him, becoming the impotent witness of the progressing inability to grasp, to legitimately make his own this "magic".

Considering all this, it is likely that the intent of "Waking Life" is precisely not to limit and canonize the scope of this unstoppable flow of life that feeds and shakes every gleam of existence, but to make it manifest through a delicate and (at times atypically) harmonious combination-interaction between the subject (who offers the cue) and the environment (which creates the context), in which it can pour and dominate at the same time, as director and main actor. It aims to stimulate the "spectator's" spirit of improvisation and involve them on a level not of mere passive emotionality but of absolute pragmatism, touching and igniting the most hidden remains of their subconscious.

Certainly, there's no point in mentioning scenes or characters, all delicious, while another note of merit goes to the musical comments (composed for the occasion by Glover Gill) that accompany some sequences and draw mainly from a repertoire evoking the bright and ethereal atmospheres of "Tango" à la Astor Piazzolla.

Lastly, I feel I must clarify a crucial point, I would say essential when tackling the view and potential internalization of something like "Waking Life". Here it is not about a mere intellectual amusement, but more of a mirror for our consciences; a sort of warning to help us clearly imprint the deep intent of undertaking a determined exploration of ourselves.