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| Ambrose and Birbiglia have different dreams in Sleepwalk With Me |
««½ Sleepwalk With Me. Written by Mike Birbiglia, Joe Birbiglia, Ira Glass & Seth Barrish. Directed by Mike Birbiglia & Seth Barrish.
Matt Pandamiglio (Mike Birbiglia) has stress. He’s
got Abby, his terrific girlfriend (Lauren Ambrose). He’s got parents (James
Rebhorn and Carol Kane) eager to help him on his journey of self-discovery. He’s
got a degree of talent that reveals itself intermittently when he does what he
loves, stand-up comedy. So why does he have stress, given all these assets? Sleepwalk With Me, Birbiglia’s debut
feature, doesn’t seem to know.
Instead of reasons, the movie is more interested in
symptoms—namely Matt’s problem with sleepwalking. Indeed, it’s not just walking
in his sleep that ails him, but full-blown acting out of his dreams. After he
falls off the bedroom dresser in the belief that he was mounted the Olympic
medal stand, Abby gently advises him to see a doctor. Matt agrees—until he
decides he’d rather get a sandwich instead.
Sleepwalk was
one of the hits at this year’s SXSW and Sundance festivals. No argument here
against the fact that it is a small, charming, easy-to-watch comedy. To a generations
of boomerang kids, Birbiglia might as well be the poster child, painfully
self-aware (but without self-understanding), burdened by expectations, more
educated than wise. Unlike Woody Allen or Albert Brooks, there’s nothing
specific about his neurosis, no ethnic tics that might peg him to some
cultural context. He might as well be from anywhere, from any class. As such,
he’s perfectly relatable.
And then there’s Ambrose, who played the ingénue in the
much-missed HBO series Six Feet Under,
and has been too long away from view. Her character here is a confection of
gorgeous red hair and vivid blue eyes and the kind of patient devotion better
men than Matt can only dream of earning. She’s the soul of the film, even
though screenwriters Birbiglia, Ira Glass et al. leave her largely
underwritten. Typical is how Sleepwalk
glides over the key confrontation between Abby and Matt, as they decide whether
to get married (she wants it, he doesn’t). Birbiglia jump-cuts through the
scene in gimmicky fashion, more or less telling his audience “yadda yadda
yadda, you know the drill.” Yeah, we know the drill, but isn’t seeing it this time, with these
characters, the whole point?
Judd Apatow has enthusiastically endorsed this film, which
says a lot about what’s right and wrong with it. Apatow has made a career out
of giving us the well-tempered egoist, the child-man who can’t grow up and
doesn’t see much reason to try. Birbiglia likewise presents his self-involved
alter-ego as a fait accompli—a schmo’s
gotta go what a schmo’s gotta do. Matt doesn’t want to marry Abby, period, and
Birbiglia isn’t going to waste time on any stinkin’ introspection.
That might be OK for Apatow, but it’s surprising that Ira
Glass’s name is attached to such an unreflective tale. For if you expect
anything out of Glass’s storytelling program on NPR, This American Life, it’s reflection.
Glass will keep his fans and Birbiglia will live another day onscreen. But
here, at least, they deliver less than meets the eye.
© 2012 Nicholas
Nicastro
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