The Science of Sleep



Originally titled "La science des rêves", this quirky 2006 French film starring Gael García Bernal and Charlotte Gainsbourg and directed by Michel Gondry is a surreal exploration of the nature of dreams, as well as a charming romance (sort of).

Under-appreciated creative-man Stéphane meets Stéphanie and Zoé moving into the room across from him and he helps move their piano - after getting injured he's invited in to heal his wounds. For some reason he neglects to tell them that he lives across from them, meaning every time he leaves he has to pretend to leave the building.

Things though get confusing as it becomes more difficult (for the audience) to tell the difference between what is real and what is a dream, due to Stéphane's Cloudcuckoolander status as he tries to get closer to Stéphanie, making gifts for her and getting more and more angry at life that he seems unable to cope with.

This film contains examples of:

 * All Just a Dream
 * All Men Are Perverts: Or so Guy keeps trying to convince Stéphane.
 * Betty and Veronica: Stéphanie is firmly in the "Betty" category, and Zoé, as an aspiring musician has elements of the "Veronica".
 * Bilingual Dialogue: Some of the conversations, especially between Stéphane and Guy are a mix of French, English, and occasionally Spanish.
 * Bunny Ears Lawyer: Despite even his own doubts, Stéphane is pretty good at his job.
 * Cloudcuckoolander: Stéphane.
 * Dream Sequence
 * Girl Next Door: Stéphanie.
 * Hallucinations: Stéphane’s dreams sometimes intrude on his waking state, to the point that it's not easy to tell which scenes are real and which are his imagination.
 * Love Letter Lunacy: Stéphane puts a note under Stéphanie's door while he's sleepwalking. Except a) he believed it was actually a dream, b) she saw him do it and c) it was asking for her roommate's phone number even though he isn't interested in her. The next morning he goes to get it back, realizing his mistake, except she's already read it.
 * Meganekko: Stéphanie.
 * Men Don't Cry: Stéphanie evokes the trope in an attempt to calm Stéphane, who averts it frequently.
 * Mind Screw: Expect at least one every five minutes. But of the playful variety, not the paranoid.
 * No Social Skills: Stéphane is an odd example. He uses his imagination to cope with a lot of the outside world but does have some friends... they are equally as strange as him but when meeting Stéphanie it becomes clear he lacks some very basic social interaction. He goes into Stalker With a Crush mode in sincere innocence, unaware that what he's doing is bad.
 * One Steve Limit: Averted.
 * Our Time Machine Is Different: The one-second time machine that may or may not be real.
 * Or Was It a Dream?: It's exceptionally easy to argue that any scene at all is a dream. Or indeed, that they all are.
 * Sanity Slippage: Stéphane's declining ability to distinguish between reality and dreams carries shades of this.
 * Stalker With a Crush: Despite his obsessive behaviour, culminating when he breaks into Stéphanie's apartment, Stéphane is a benign version, and his more questionable pursuits of her are portrayed as a result of his general social cluelessness.
 * Triligual Bonus: Considering that Mexican Stéphane and his French acquaintances have a habit of maneuvering through the language barrier through the use of English.
 * What Do You Mean It Wasn't Made On Drugs?