Dir. Marc Forster, US, 2005, 98 mins
Cast: Ewan McGregor, Naomi Watts, Ryan Gosling
Review by Carol Allen
The dream world between life and death is not a new one for film. In "A Matter of Life and Death" David Niven argues for his right to return to life as he lies dying after being shot down in World War II, while in the 2003 teleplay "Promoted to Glory" alcoholic tramp Ken Stott finds romance and redemption in the Salvation Army as he hovers between this world and the next. Policeman John Simm's betwixt and between dream in the just finished "Life on Mars" series has sent him back in time to meet his childhood. The difference with "Stay" is we don't know who is the dreamer.
The story starts in what appears to be the real world. Henry Letham (Gosling) is seen in a shocked state at the scene of a horrendous car accident. He is referred by his psychiatrist (Janine Garafalo), who has suffered a mysterious breakdown, to her colleague Sam Foster (McGregor), because Henry is threatening to commit suicide on the eve of his forthcoming 21st birthday. But as Sam gets drawn further into his disturbed young patient's world in his efforts to dissuade him from his intention, his own world starts to become increasingly disorientating, until there are times when he is becoming Henry and Henry is becoming him.
Forster creates the surreal dreamlike atmosphere very cleverly and gradually. At first it's just apparently playing with time. Henry is talking to Sam in his office, while looking out of the window at a couple in the courtyard below. We then cut to them and discover it's Sam and his girlfriend Lila (Watts). Then there is Sam's blind mentor Patterson (Bob Hoskins), whom Henry is convinced is his dead father. Sam goes to visit Henry's mother (Kate Burton), who is living in a house totally without furniture and behaving more than somewhat oddly, but he later discovers Henry's mother is also dead. There's an incident involving some workmen moving a piano and a small boy, who looks at Sam and asks his mother "Is that man going to die?" Some time later Sam walks down the same street and the same incident is repeated. The whole unsettling, dreamlike atmosphere is emphasised by spooky transitions and lavish visual effects, which turn Manhattan into a shifting and unreal landscape.
McGregor gives the film a solid centre. Gosling, a very talented young actor, is convincingly odd as Henry, while Watts makes the most of the somewhat underwritten part of Sam's artist girlfriend, a former patient and recovering junkie. To be fair, I think you probably have to have a taste for this sort of thing to enjoy it. It is not as tightly written as say "Sixth Sense", which is of a similar genre. But if you have a taste for the weirdly spooky - and I do - it is intriguing and visually it's a bit of a trip.
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