Rating: 
Summary: Fantasia without the music - a hypnotic film
Review: This film is so visually stunning, I don't have the words to describe it. I highly recommend seeing it. It will leave you speechless. Beautifully presented.
Rating:
Summary: Great Movie, but then again I'm a moron....
Review: This is a really great movie, totally engrossing and entertaining. I can't recommend it enough. I will, however, acknowledge that it is probably not for all tastes; I just don't understand why people who didn't like it can't do the same. But no, the criticizers can almost never be content with trashing the movie/book/music that they are ostensibly reviewing. Instead they turn their wrath immediately from the subject at hand to those morons, like me, who actually enjoyed the work in question. It's strange....But anyway, I think anyone who criticizes the MOVIE based on the depth of the philosophical content has missed the point entirely and has maybe taken the whole thing a little too seriously. I'm pretty sure Linklater didn't regard this project as his own personal effort to displace Aristotle in the western canon (heck, during the discussion of free will he has a character explicitly acknowledge that much of what is being discussed could be called sophomoric). Waking Life is anything but didactic. It is, like Lynch's Mulholland Drive, a DREAM. And just as Mulholland Drive is a dream of and by (so to speak) Hollywood, Waking Life is a dream of and by ideas. And you can't (or at least in my opinion you shouldn't) judge a representation of a dream against what you think would be a proper representation of something else altogether. One thing I would like to say in Linklater's defense: To suggest that NONE of the philosophical riffs in the film have any sort or academic merit is just plain obstinate. Many of the actors in the film are, in fact, academics, and 3 that I can think of off the top of my head are philosophy professors, who helped craft their monologues and presumably know at least a little (though, I grant you, by no means nearly as much) about the topics as our friendly Amazon critics. In the criticizer's defense: It's true, Waking Life does not reveal the meaning of life or confirm the existence of God. Sorry if that ruins it for you....
Well, I've said my peace, and in doing so I realize that I'm diving headlong into hypocrisy when I urge reviewers to, please, talk all you want about the movie/book/music in question, but leave us poor total strangers alone.
Rating:
Summary: Inspiring.
Review: I accidentally stumbled upon this movie on cable and I absolutely adored it, and knew I had to own it! If you are the type who likes books or movies that provoke your thoughts or change your way of thinking, this is perfect for you. After watching it I knew I would never look at human existence the same way again. Watching this movie requires you to do some thinking on your own as you watch. It will introduce you to new ideas and get your brain going. The philosophies discussed in this movie are really very profound and enlightening, all set to a beautiful soundtrack and an unusual style of animation that is both realistic and surreal at the same time. If you are a "thinker," you will LOVE this movie.
Rating: 
Summary: Something Different
Review: "Waking Life" is not a film for everyone. In fact, in my opinion it's not a film for almost anyone. That is not to say I don't recommend it, because I do. I think this is a film that everyone should see, but I would be ridiculously idealistic to say that most people would enjoy or even be interested in what "Waking Life" has to say. Ironically enough, one of the main themes of the film is the need to "wake" people who have become complacent, it's just that those type of people are the same ones who probably couldn't make it through fifteen minutes of this film without literally falling asleep. It's a real shame, but the simple fact of the matter remains that the attention span of today's average movie audience is just not equipped to handle this film.
"Waking Life" is not really so much a film in the traditional sense as it is a series of philosophical discussions, a montage of people sharing ideas and seriously exploring all facets of life. There is really no plot, only the wanderings of the protagonist as he navigates his way through a surreal dream state, taking in the things that the various characters he meets have to say. I myself found this series of theories and intellectual meanderings both fascinating and stimulating. The film's animation also serves to increase the feeling of wonder and discovery as it perfectly creates a hallucigenic, otherworldly setting. All in all, in a perfect world I would make "Waking Life" required viewing in the hopes that it could "wake" some people up and start them thinking. Okay, I have reached my limit on puns so until next time...
Rating:
Summary: Turn On The Light
Review: Is every innovation mere pretension? Is making a conceptually and visually stunning film just an attempt to show-off? If you answered yes to either question--or are too elite to endure listening to other people speak passionately about ideas--perhaps you should reach for You've Got Mail instead. Granted, there are virtually none of the usual cinematic tensions (romantic, etc.) to capture a viewer's interest. Waking Life relies solely on the power of each character's ideas and the accompanying imagery (for example, someone mentions "subatomic particles" and two appear dancing at the bottom of the screen) to hold the audience's attention--a courageous undertaking, if you ask me. Rare is a movie that affirms life rather than offers an escape from it. Compared to the typical Hollywood dribble, Waking Life marks a creative breakthrough. Here we are taken on a speedy ride through cognition and are left with a renewed exuberance to question the unanswerable. Wouldn't life be so much more exhilarating if real people were this eager to share their thoughts? Whether or not you end up loving or hating this film, it deserves to be seen. Like A Clockwork Orange, Waking Life ventures so strongly from movie norms that it's impossible to not feel strongly about.
Rating:
Summary: Terribly interesting...
Review: This movie offers interesting theories, and answers many questions related to 'existence.' This movie challenges you to reconsider the validity of your surroundings.
Rating:
Summary: It's fine.
Review: I am really surprised to read that some people felt this film is either pretentious or intellectually low brow. This movie can perhaps be best appreciated by people who are not intimidated by the poetry of ideas, and those who invest some quantity of themselves and emotion into the content and occurrence of their own philosophical ramblings and occurrence in general. For some of us, the important stuff really is what happens between customers at the quickie mart and this film gives it a real nice goin'-over.
Rating: 
Summary: so disappointed
Review: I heard such fantastic things, but I couldn't even finish it. I felt like I was sitting and listening to one of those guys you knew in college who talked and talked about postmodernism and existentialism, but never actually SAID anything. Instead of wasting two hours of your time, just go to Starbucks and drop in on a conversation. You'll achieve the same meaningless results.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting animation technique but nothing else
Review: The 'story' is non-existent, only following one guy around as he goes from place to place wandering aimlessly. I do not exaggerate. What follows is nothing more than over-intellectualized psycho-babble about the meaning of life. Heavy on the babble. Heavy on the psycho. Only 2-3 snippets, as far as I remember, featured "the common man"'s plight... The conversations didn't even spark my interest in the subject matter because it all sounded so pretensious. A perfectly intolerable film. Avoid this one.
Rating:
Summary: I usually dont go for animation, unless its Harryhausen
Review: My son dragged me to this movie..and I loved it!!
Besides the dialogues, I also enjoyed the warbling edges and movements which suggests to me true life, how the edges are not as sharply defined as we think them to be. It was a poem of a movie. remember to flick the lite on and off :)
| 
