Dario Argento's return to his most familiar and favourite genre, murder mystery (Giallo), is this 2001 film Non ho Sonno aka Sleepless which he also co-wrote with Franco Ferrini, his long time companion. The film is about a grisly murder that took place in 1983 and involved a "dwarf" and a very traumatic thing related to that. Seventeen years pass by and an unlucky prostitute seems to meet the same killer or a copycat, and so the years dead case becomes active again and the old detective (great Max von Sydow) is called back for some help, and he indeed starts to investigate the case even though he's been retired for many years. The plot is confusing to say the least and the film is again overlong, but are there any positive aspects in this newer film by Italian horror maestro?
The legendary rock band Goblin with Claudio Simonetti reunited for this film and that is easily among the film's greatest merits as their score and atmospheric electric guitar soundtrack is almost as wonderful as it is in Argento classics like Tenebre (1982) or Profondo Rosso (1975). The film's first 20 minutes are also among the best the film has to offer as it includes a nightmarishly prolonged chase in a night train during a heavy thunderstorm, exactly like in the masterpiece Suspiria (1977) and its first 15 minutes as well as in the finale of Tenebre, and the storm rages here as menacingly as it did in those classics. Even a less than a second frame of a lightning from the sky creates a wonderful tension here accompanied with the pounding music. Also the editing and camerawork is clever in that beginning and it is quite sad how the tone slows down and gets more tired after the promising beginning.
As mentioned, von Sydow is also very noteworthy aspect in the film and he is a professional, even though Argento definitely is not always too great with actors. It is easy to see von Sydow doesn't even need the assistance by the director, he knows how to do the scene and thus he saves a lot from this film, too. The typical magic bits of Argento like incredible colors, camera drives and darkness are only occasionally present here. The long camera drive over a carpet is like the similar scene involving an entire apartment with its walls and roof in Tenebre, and the darkness and usage of shadows is close to his noirish, but very flawed, 1996 film La Sindrome di Stendhal aka The Stendhal's Syndrome which starred his own daughter, Asia Argento. Non ho Sonno isn't too hypnotic or wonderful a film anymore, and clues of this were also visible in the mentioned 1996 film as well as the disastrous Trauma (1993) and Il Fantasma dell'opera aka Phantom of the Opera (1998). Apparently one thing Argento always manages to do are the extremely painful and graphic scenes of violence.
The violence is mainly towards females in this film which will definitely annoy some viewers as the scenes are easy to interpret misogynistic, but still there are normal, natural and safe female character(s) in the film, too, and among the leads, so let's not blame Argento for the former thing. The murders themselves are perhaps the strongest he has ever shot and come almost close to gratuitous exploitation with plenty of close ups of gushing wounds and violated victims. One scene is very similar with the "teeth crushing" of Profondo Rosso, as nasty and painful as in that film and all these scenes of infernal violence seem to serve is the shock value to create the "horror" which would be in fact much more effective if everything was not shown, or at least if the visuals and music were more noteworthy than in this film.
The film lacks again a theme of any kind so the film will look very frustrating and boring if one searches for something more than just a "surprising" murder mystery that goes on for too long. There's again an explanation of some kind for the acts of the murderer but they are not always so easy to take seriously, unfortunately. The film includes also a quite repulsive scene of a child witnessing a brutal murder of a relative so scenes as strong as these would require the piece to have a real theme and thus more reason to include scenes like those. The film is not so artistic anymore in any way, so unwillingly or not Argento has this time created only a piece of violent mystery thriller to satisfy the audience by the "entertainment" received by that, nothing more, those few cinematic merits mentioned above excluded naturally.
It is quite painful for the viewer to sit through films like this, Trauma and La Sindrome di Stendhal as they feel so slow and boring, mostly because the characters never become too interesting or multi leveled and there are scenes that are unnecessarily too long and not so important to the plot development, and they also usually involve, for example, the protagonist quite irritatingly talking to himself/herself as he/she tries to solve the case by himself in peace. Someway it all was and is really interesting in giallo classics Profondo Rosso or Tenebre as those films have more interesting characters and overall more merits in the imagery and soundtrack. Someway Argento seems to have lost his touch to the magic he owns, but hopefully he manages to get it back again some day. He just should concentrate on other things than graphic violence and too untraditional cases and explanations in his films.
Non ho Sonno is a 3/10 experience for me, after seen the uncut Italian version that has also been released in the UK. The US video/DVD under title "I Can't Sleep" is cut for violence and gore. This is on the same level with Stendhal, and that level is not too great or recommendable. Below that level are still Trauma and Phantom of the Opera so it could still be worse but something I wouldn't like to see from Argento.
The legendary rock band Goblin with Claudio Simonetti reunited for this film and that is easily among the film's greatest merits as their score and atmospheric electric guitar soundtrack is almost as wonderful as it is in Argento classics like Tenebre (1982) or Profondo Rosso (1975). The film's first 20 minutes are also among the best the film has to offer as it includes a nightmarishly prolonged chase in a night train during a heavy thunderstorm, exactly like in the masterpiece Suspiria (1977) and its first 15 minutes as well as in the finale of Tenebre, and the storm rages here as menacingly as it did in those classics. Even a less than a second frame of a lightning from the sky creates a wonderful tension here accompanied with the pounding music. Also the editing and camerawork is clever in that beginning and it is quite sad how the tone slows down and gets more tired after the promising beginning.
As mentioned, von Sydow is also very noteworthy aspect in the film and he is a professional, even though Argento definitely is not always too great with actors. It is easy to see von Sydow doesn't even need the assistance by the director, he knows how to do the scene and thus he saves a lot from this film, too. The typical magic bits of Argento like incredible colors, camera drives and darkness are only occasionally present here. The long camera drive over a carpet is like the similar scene involving an entire apartment with its walls and roof in Tenebre, and the darkness and usage of shadows is close to his noirish, but very flawed, 1996 film La Sindrome di Stendhal aka The Stendhal's Syndrome which starred his own daughter, Asia Argento. Non ho Sonno isn't too hypnotic or wonderful a film anymore, and clues of this were also visible in the mentioned 1996 film as well as the disastrous Trauma (1993) and Il Fantasma dell'opera aka Phantom of the Opera (1998). Apparently one thing Argento always manages to do are the extremely painful and graphic scenes of violence.
The violence is mainly towards females in this film which will definitely annoy some viewers as the scenes are easy to interpret misogynistic, but still there are normal, natural and safe female character(s) in the film, too, and among the leads, so let's not blame Argento for the former thing. The murders themselves are perhaps the strongest he has ever shot and come almost close to gratuitous exploitation with plenty of close ups of gushing wounds and violated victims. One scene is very similar with the "teeth crushing" of Profondo Rosso, as nasty and painful as in that film and all these scenes of infernal violence seem to serve is the shock value to create the "horror" which would be in fact much more effective if everything was not shown, or at least if the visuals and music were more noteworthy than in this film.
The film lacks again a theme of any kind so the film will look very frustrating and boring if one searches for something more than just a "surprising" murder mystery that goes on for too long. There's again an explanation of some kind for the acts of the murderer but they are not always so easy to take seriously, unfortunately. The film includes also a quite repulsive scene of a child witnessing a brutal murder of a relative so scenes as strong as these would require the piece to have a real theme and thus more reason to include scenes like those. The film is not so artistic anymore in any way, so unwillingly or not Argento has this time created only a piece of violent mystery thriller to satisfy the audience by the "entertainment" received by that, nothing more, those few cinematic merits mentioned above excluded naturally.
It is quite painful for the viewer to sit through films like this, Trauma and La Sindrome di Stendhal as they feel so slow and boring, mostly because the characters never become too interesting or multi leveled and there are scenes that are unnecessarily too long and not so important to the plot development, and they also usually involve, for example, the protagonist quite irritatingly talking to himself/herself as he/she tries to solve the case by himself in peace. Someway it all was and is really interesting in giallo classics Profondo Rosso or Tenebre as those films have more interesting characters and overall more merits in the imagery and soundtrack. Someway Argento seems to have lost his touch to the magic he owns, but hopefully he manages to get it back again some day. He just should concentrate on other things than graphic violence and too untraditional cases and explanations in his films.
Non ho Sonno is a 3/10 experience for me, after seen the uncut Italian version that has also been released in the UK. The US video/DVD under title "I Can't Sleep" is cut for violence and gore. This is on the same level with Stendhal, and that level is not too great or recommendable. Below that level are still Trauma and Phantom of the Opera so it could still be worse but something I wouldn't like to see from Argento.