In the early 90's, Richard Linklater gave us the amusingly quirky philosophical comedy "Slacker". In the 2000's, when Linklater was a much more established filmmaker, he semi-updated this older work, but, instead of focusing on the daytime that defined "Slacker", Linklater seems to have trapped "Waking Life" in the midst of the night. Even when daylight floods the lens, our protagonist and guide through his own mind is as aware as we are that he is trapped within his own dream...and the dream layers are stacking up. He awakens only to be stranded in another subsection of his growing, energetic subconscious, and many serious discussions of and questions concerning deep philosophical thought are explored in depth. The tone is certainly more serious and less self mocking than "Slacker", but the entertainment value is still there, and many little moments of clever comedy are perfectly placed throughout (a talking monkey, an uproariously absurd encounter between the protagonist and an eccentric clerk he believes to have seen earlier in the dream); however, there is also plenty of fuel and food for extreme existentialist thought dealing with death and, even more prominently and uniquely, dreams. Is life a dream? Is life not life, but really death? Is anyone really here, or is it all just one's mind? Questions, questions, questions...no real answers. Moments, swirling, moving....movements...the whole film flows like a river, it feels like an actual DREAM! There are reoccurring themes, ideas, and faces, but there is no real narrative, at least not in a remotely conventional sense. It is scene after scene of discussion and discourse, characters come and go out of nowhere, some even die outrageously, while others take on new personalities and minds as the tale trails along...there are appearances from professors, philosophers, doctors...the likes of Ethan Hawke, Alex Jones (?!), and Steven Soderbergh have brief splashes of screen time in which they spew brief speeches jam packed with rigorous insight into all sorts of topics...stories are told, political rants are screamed, theories are deeply analyzed, love is discussed, hate is expressed...and it all culminates in one of the greatest, most totally chilling and thought provoking monologues I've ever heard, performed with grace, humor, realism, emotion, and intelligence by the man behind the camera himself, Richard Linklater.

Remind me to tell you about that dream i had last night.. there is something about animation that keeps me attached for more than 15 minutes... i always wondered about rem sleep and the meaning of.. I am alive and not in the waiting room.. keep work like this coming. Keep dreamingRegardsA

A lot is been written about this movie here and yes, it's great. What it wants to give us is the most precious for a human being: awakening or enlightenment. That's what the movie is about. It becomes clear in the scene in which Linklater talks about time and getting to the yes. This means a state of consciousness. One accepts all facets of his life without any inner resistance and also has no feeling of time in this clear state of mind. Howsoever, i know two people who had that experience after a mental process that took months initiated by this movie. I recommend it to anyone doubting on his life and who is open to new views. Thanks for this unique movie.

Filmed as an indie quickie before going through its arduous and peculiar rotoscoping process in post, Waking Life is Richard Linklater's 2001 ode to the existential. Wiley Wiggins plays... well, who-knows-who, a young man drifting through a series of encounters with a range of characters (played by various actors including Linklater regulars Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy and Adam Goldberg), all delivering unto him dense philosophical monologues or dialogues. The plot is as faint as a half-remembered dream; although it is implied that Wiggins' protagonist is killed by a car at the start, and I got the sense that in that terminal moment he is recalling a series of profound human moments throughout his life. If nothing else, the wispily connected scenes provide an accessible introduction to modern philosophy, covering topics such as free will, human potential, neuroscience, time, and the self. The only vaguely mainstream movie I can think of which is comparatively philosophically dense would be Cosmopolis, although Linklater's film doesn't have the emotional payoff of Cronenberg's. Fans of A Scanner Darkly (Linklater's 2006 Philip K Dick adaptation) will be familiar with the art technique he uses here. Sometimes it appears to be a simple case of watercolour-style painting over filmed imagery, but as the narrative progresses the pictures become more surreal and nightmarish; so, we're left with a range of styles from impressionist to minimalist to Gilliam-esque animated madness. Obviously Waking Life is hugely indulgent (Linklater even gives himself the climactic speech) but I don't see this as a criticism. The script comes across like a desk drawer full of scribbled ideas because it probably was. But what ideas they are, interrogating notions of memory, identity, and dream logic with skill and clarity. Only on occasions does the writing stray into condescending territory – the suggestion, for example, that we're all sleepwalkers who'll "sell our souls for minimum wage" is clichéd. More often than not, though, the words make us think. Crucially, they make us think for ourselves. Waking Life was made prior to 11 September 2001, yet released in October. "A new world is possible," one character says, oblivious to the cynical new world that was to come. I find there is a sadness in Waking Life's hopefulness about human potential. Toward the end it puts forward the idea that life may be but a dream after death – a moving metaphysical thought that seems somehow too abstract for a post-9/11 world; a world which has seen the Dream turned sour.