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Summary: waking life change my life
Review: waking life, how shall i start.this film was a work of art, one of the best films i have ever seen in my life the whole film with its charactors alway going into these crazy very indepth rants and in to a train of thought that i can only get with the use of mushrooms. so i feel this was a amazeing film and every one that can even think should watch it and watch it more then once so it sinks in.
andy .w
Rating:
Summary: Great!
Review: This was a great animated, thought-provoking movie. I watched it because a friend recommended it to me and I have since recommeded it to many other friends. This movie should be watched without interruptions and/or distractions, to get the full philosophical effect!
Rating: 
Summary: Cool visuals, philsophial rhetoric, little more
Review: This movie is good if you want to learn and think, but it's not much for "entertainment." That's not the purpose it serves. The animation is fun for a while, but the novelty will wear thin midway through, and then you're in it solely for the monologues. I'd recommend this movie to anyone interested in philosophy, lucid dreaming, or animation. DVD extras really make the thing worthwhile though. All freethinkers must at least rent this thing.
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Summary: Wake walking!
Review: This highly original animated feature is the finest production of it's respective year. Profound and signifigant ideas come at the viewer like a rocket and provoke our inner feelings to come front center. At times the film can be too cerebral for it's own good, but the spectacular digital camera / layered, always shifting, multi-colored animation keeps it enjoyable.
After Wiley Wiggins' character is struck by a car, he floats in limbo between a dream world and eternal life. He walks around meeting colorful characters who present theories on dreams, love, sex, the afterlife, and much more to the simple reply to "wake up".
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Summary: See a dream through Waking eyes
Review: This was a fantastic movie that just flows beautifly from one scene to the next along a smooth tango-jazz-classical soundtrack... Each scene runs it's own course like different episodes of the same show. It has the sort of same discontinuous flow that a dream might have, and yet it all seems to point to an underlying theme of life, death, and dreams. Deciding where the story begins and ends is up to you, but there are so many ways to enjoy this movie, that I'd recomend it to anyone.
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Summary: Trippy Seasick Animation
Review: Buy this DVD, and watch it one or two chapters at a time. I say this only because the dialogue can get really tedious, and sometimes it seems to be trying to hard to be profound. The good thing about that is I find a new interesting thought every time I watch the movie. Also, the animation is quite beautiful, but the constant undulating shapes can get to you after a while.
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Summary: great animation, but what's it trying to say?
Review: The animation in this DVD is super, and alone worth the price. But the story, if there is one, or at least the theme, if there is one, gets lost in the confusion. Toward the end, a plot line finally emerges, though it doesn't seem related to the beginning and middle portions of the movie. It is about whether the protagonist is dead or alive; he can't seem to wake up and isn't sure. It is too reminiscent of "Jacob's Ladder" to satisfy, and besides, at least in "Jacob's Ladder" there was a concrete outcome; the viewer was able to understand what happened. In "Waking Life" it still isn't clear.
It appears the writer(s) had some good ideas, but didn't provide near enough structure in the film to enable the viewer to see where they were going. Perhaps they weren't going anywhere, and while that works with some films, it doesn't with this one. This one is in desperate need of coherence and connections, and much of the philosophical material, which is presented in a boring manner reminiscent of an impersonal lecture hall, fails to guide or connect the scenes. If the writers wanted to present something on the issue of people living without really feeling alive and connected to the world, as the review on the back of the DVD implies, they failed to do it. They could have if they'd done something different with the ending, but once they confused the concept of physical death and acceptance of physical death with the issue of living without feeling truly alive, they destroyed any lasting value this film might have had.
Rating: 
Summary: Wake up!
Review: I saw this movie once, and I never want to see it again.
The creative forces behind the movie were trying to be original and freethinking with the movie's philosophy, but everything they talked about I had already heard, or have heard since in my high school philosphy/theology class. I didn't hear a single original idea, just a sloppy mish-mash of atheist existential morality, libertarian rage-against-the-system political rants, New-Age interpretation of mankind's future, and something about a collective universal consciousness. Add to that a dash of misinterpreted Christianity and dumb science (one character/orator is in denial about quantum physics) and you have the philosophy of Waking Life.
As if that's not bad enough, the movie's preachy to boot. In lieu of a plot, Waking Life offers a series of disjointed monologues (of course those people sound convincing when no one challenges them!) and a bare-bones story about some guy (who's never named in the movie) who can't figure out if he's dreaming or waking, and can't seem to wake up. So the movie alternates between ramming pseudo-intellectual-existential-New-Age philosohical offal down your throat and mocking your attempts to make sense of its sorry lack of a plot.
Yes, the rotoscopy animation was amazing, but not good enough to redeem the film. I wish Mystery Science Theater 3000, back in their glory days, could have time-traveled 100 years into our future, bought the rights to this film, and then taken it back with them to give it their special treatement. That would make Waking Life both more entertaining and more educational.
In conclusion, if Waking Life is truly representative of independent cinema, I'd rather be a philistine.
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Summary: Cool way of making a new kind of movie, but no plot
Review: I liked the technical stuff about how they actually made the movie a lot more than the movie itself. The movie just wandered around and didn't seem to have any focus, good characters or plot for that matter. But the behind the scenes stuff is great.
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Summary: Wake up and smell the insights
Review: Richard Linklater could just be the spokesperson for the twenty-somethings of the early 21st century. In an industry that mostly accepts life as it is and turns to cheap sex jokes, Linklater asks the Big Questions and dwells on real human issues. "Waking Life" is no exception. Similar in plot to his debut "Slacker," the film is about 100% more philosophical, with characters talking about subjects like free will, evolution, reincarnation, God, and dreaming (lots of dreaming!). Yes, there is a LOT of talking in "Waking Life," probably about three times as much as your average film. Thankfully, Linklater keeps things interesting with the amazing animation technique he uses throughout the movie. With a different animator for each scene, "Waking Life" never gets tedious. In fact, it makes one anticipate what new and otherworldly images they will see next. Probably one of the most intelligent movies you will ever see, "Waking Life" is the kind of movie you invite your intellectual friends over and, paper and pen in hands, watch with open-minds and a time for discussion. Try it sometime; you just might learn something that will change your life.
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