Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

Just perfect...

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

This movie is worth noticing. Megan Follows plays a troubled young woman who has been involved with prostitution and illegal immigration. It's in the form of a mystery where her questions are gradually answered as the film progresses.Positives: Well produced, beautifully photographed, well directed. Megan Follows is showcased beautifully. Negatives: It's about mental illness. The writer has an unhealthy attitude toward men and heterosexual relations, obviously feminist. The writer inserts her Jewish propaganda against the Catholic church as well. Actually this presentation of child abduction is disinformation, this is not a true explanation.The film appeared on Canadian premium TV in 1990, and I don't know where else. It's not available now. The audio was in stereo.

"Deep Sleep" is a well-paced psychological thriller, reminiscent of Hitchcock's "Marnie". It makes appropriate connections between right-wing politics and violence, in the manner of John Sayles' films. Intriguing and worth watching. The lead role is played by Megan Follows (of TV's Anne of Green Gables fame) as an emotionally volatile young woman, a brilliant bit of casting. The plot twists, turns and goes in directions that may surprise the viewer. Solid performances are given by other actors in supporting roles. The controversial issues explored by "Deep Sleep" are not glossed over nor trivialized. The director and writer, Patricia Gruben's creativity, though fueled by her anger, never treats the audience as prisoners to a "correct" polemic or point of view. We are left to understand our own responses to vividly photographed scenes of physical and emotional hide-and-seek that work on many levels. A viewer attentive to the verbal and visual clues may unlock the mystery before the shock ending.