Chasing Sleep Reviews

This film's over-extended notion about culpability would be suitable to a short psychological study, but disintegrates when pushed toward feature film length. Professor Ed Saxon (Jeff Daniels) phones the police when his wife, Eve (Kristie Dickinson), fails to come home. Plagued by insomnia, Ed loses track of time and begins seeing things, so when Detective Derm (Gil Bellows) questions him, he picks up on Ed's uncertainty and defensiveness. Eve's journal yields some juicy details that point police in the direction of her co-worker and lover, George (Julian McMahon). But George claims that Ed probably punished his wife in a jealous rage. Perhaps Ed is repressing the memory of his violence, and that's why he can't sleep. Tormented by blackouts, Ed welcomes a visit from student Sadie, (Emily Bergl), an oasis of concern. But the supposedly shy coed has her own seductive agenda, and an affair with Sadie will do nothing to prove Ed's innocence to the cops. Prodded by Inspector Derm, Ed sees a grief counselor (Guy Sanville) but far from exorcising Ed's demons, the ineffectual doctor exacerbates his sense of isolation. Ed's hallucinations, which include a bathtub filling up with blood, intensify. Displeased with the police department's shilly-shallying, macho George skulks around Ed's basement for some vigilante justice, which Ed heads off. But once Eve's corpse is found, Ed becomes totally unhinged: Does his mania stem from grief or guilt? This production occasionally achieves a state of dread worthy of David Cronenberg, but can't sustain that atmosphere. Ed's hallucinations don't seem integral to his breakdown, feeling instead like nightmarish visions borrowed from other horror movies.