Sleepers Reviews

I already saw this movie but since it was a while back and since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out again. First of all, I have always been rather amazed how high this movie was rated on IMDB and, with a 7.5, it sounded as if it was some kind of masterpiece (it was apparently a box-office hit when it was released). On top of that, there was quite an impressive cast involved so, before watching this flick, I had some rather high expectations, at least, the first time around. Well, after re-watching the damned thing, I figured out what did work and what didn't work with this movie. Basically, the first hour during which they focus on the characters when they were kids was actually pretty good and even heartbreaking. Indeed, you really got a genuine feeling of this time and place and all the kids involved gave some solid performances. Unfortunately, the second part during which they flashforward about 10 years later was so not effective, I'm afraid. I didn't mention this before but the whole thing was supposed to be based on a true story. However, the book this movie was based on has been widely criticized and it's rather easy to understand why. Indeed, everything happening in this 2nd half was just so far-fetched, it seemed really unlikely that it even occurred. But that wasn't even the biggest issue. Indeed, while the youth scenes had a nice flow and felt genuine, the adult scenes all felt rather clunky as they focused too much on this unconvincing scheme and not enough on the actual characters involved. It's too bad because they had a really neat cast, especially for this 2nd part (Kevin Bacon, Billy Crudup, Robert De Niro, Minnie Driver, Vittorio Gassman, Dustin Hoffman, Jason Patric, Brad Pitt, Brad Renfro). Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, it was still a decent watch though and it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.