Customer Reviews

Winter Sleepers

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

...much better. No question that Lola is a great movie, but turn off the soundtrack and it might get boring. Reminds me one of O'Henry's stories. Winter Sleepers takes it from a different angle. Not how the things might come if we miss by a minute the train or the bus, or if we take right or left. Winter Sleepers is deep. It tells you of what happens to us,is a reflection of how we behave in life itself...And we strugle to remember things we've done, to find explanation,no wonder!

I don't know what it was, perhaps the copy I saw was horrible, it was a VHS and it looked horrible, even though it was an original it looked like a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy. But this has to be my least favorite of his films. The shots were boring, the story was slow, and I suppose I was comparing it to much to "Run Lola Run" with all it's flare and beautiful color.
But by the time it ended, the story captured me. The ending (which I'll try not to give away too much) was great. I heard this was one of hte films that inspired Memento. Tykwer sure knows how ti find those intricite stories and bring them home.
SO if you love his work, you must watch, but make sure you have a DVD copy. If you didn't love "Princess and hte Warrior" you won't like this, if you are expecting another "Run Lola Run" I suggest you run the other way.

Just for the use of colours alone, this movie is worth seeing. It's beautiful and thought provoking and shows another side to Tom Tykwer's work. If you've seen his latest film, admittedly a directorial takeover, Heaven. The cinematography is like that of Run Lola Run, but I'd say more thoughtful. I enjoyed this movie a lot!

The creator of 'Run Lola Run' has more goodies in his bag with this tale of intertwined lines of fate. The story was engaging and the gritty european sensibility, once again, a refreshing respite from the slickness of most major Hollywood productions. It reminded me a little of Andy Warhol's 'Bad' - as it's not so much a story about anything in particular as much as it's a story about what happen's to the characters as they go about their lives and some rather difficult stuff happens.

Again - I love Tom T's work - it's very well crafted, everything in it is obviously very considered yet plays quite naturally. The suspension of disbelief is easy and there's always something about the characters that gives you a fresh perspective about life and people to consider.

The picture on the cover is somewhat misdirecting - the scene from which it is taken is actually not a comfortable, cozy time for lovers.

When it was all over, I was kind of hoping that this was just episode 1 of 10 - the story and the same - or different - people could have gone on for much longer and still maintained my interest. But that's what a Tom Tykwer movie does for you.

PS: T.T.s 'The Princess And The Warrior' is another AMAZING movie, slicker and newer than 'Winter Sleepers' but more good stuff from this great director.

Beautiful scenery in this movie. Director Tom is brilliant when it comes to cinematography. Great story about a group of people, some of which know each other, whose lives are all somehow connected. If you like Run Lola Run, then you'll like this one.

Due to the success of his second film, the international smash hit, "Run Lola Run", Tom Tykwer's first feature, which had until now only been seen in Europe, has been dusted off and trotted out onto the North American DVD market. Although I'm usually a sucker for Kieslowski-esque ruminations on coincidence vs. fate, I found this film to be emotionally sterile, albeit flashily so, which was also my opinion on the much overrated "Run Lola Run". The film no doubt recalls Altman's "Short Cuts" and P.T. Anderson's "Magnolia" (although the latter was released after "Winter Sleepers"), but that's giving the film too much credit since Tykwer's stories and characters are nowhere near as compelling. Specifically, two of the three interconnected stories did not hold my interest. The only story I had fun watching involved the aimless and destructive relationship between Marco and Rebecca. However, that's only because of the delicious performances from Heino Ferch as the boorish but handsome and sexy lothario, and Floriane Daniels as the needy but beautiful sexpot, and not because of their connections to the other two stories in service of Tykwer's overreaching theme. The blandness of the story involving the father and his comatose daugher is the most problematic since it fails to deliver what is ostensibly the emotional core of the film. But this film does show Tykwer to be a flashy and distinctive filmmaker, qualities that has since made him an international star. The sequence at the end of "Winter Sleepers" is particular impressive although I really don't see how it adds to the story. Tykwer has proven to be a technical wizard, now he's got to prove that he can tell a good story.

Something tells me I have no clue what I'm talking about when it comes to this movie. Still, the only reason I rented it was because it's by the director of Run Lola Run which was an incredible movie. And it simply didn't deliver. If you want more of the same, wait for Princess and Warrior - or maybe for Bourne Identity with Franka Potente coming out in May 2002.
The sheer obsessiveness with coincidences displayed in this movie is tiring. It may be pretty... but it's not entertaining.

Winstar did a pretty terrible job on this presentation. Not only is it mis-framed (1.85:1 when it's supposed to be 2.35:1), but the picture quality is extremely hazy at times, and becomes hard to watch.

Picture quality is quite fuzzy, like a transfer from VHS tape. The trailer is even worse!

Many movies, most of them made in the wake of David Lynch's erratic career, are usually tagged as "mysterious" or "enigmatic" (think of some of Atom Egoyan's films). Tykwer's "Winter Sleepers", made just before "Run Lola Run", not only deserves the accolate but ennobles it. Set in the bleak, wintry German Alps, it intertwines several stories -- a failing farmer, a translator of romance novels, an amnesiac photographer -- in a story that shows how their lives intersected one day when a terrible accident befell two of them.

Tykwer takes his audience's intelligence for granted and does not spill all the beans at once. He lets us be participants in the puzzle instead of passive recipients, and the result is a movie that's rich, strange, and endearing all at the same time.