Fest Track On Sirk TV Film Review: WHERE SWEET DREAMS DIE [Dances With Films NY - New York, New York]
Certain films test the tendency of an audience but bring to mind ideas at the forefront with a visual flair. "Where Sweet Dreams Die" is an ambitious interesting motif on the ideas permeating our time. Zachary Laoutides writes and stars in the film as Luca, a down-on-his-luck would-be inheritor/restauranteur who seems like he is about to lose his Italian restaurant in the New York area (possibly Queens) to an incoming Syrian patriarch who, in uncertain terms, was offered it from the context of a Russian mobster/trafficker. The movie boasts that it is from some of the people that made "American History X" and "Taxi Driver"...and that might be true as far as the producers. However the film itself is a mishmash of interesting drone shots, Scorsese and DeNiro impersonations and a slew of AI created functionalities aimed at speaking to the current polarization of America. This could also be keyed in or compared to "Killing Them Softly", Dominic Moll's renumeration on democracy starring Brad Pitt a few years back. "Sweet Dreams" is not that movie. It is a completely different animal.
Laoutides has some chops but many times he retreats into a DeNiro impression, which is not bad but also not hardly original and a bit overdone. Laoutides' progressions of thought are pretty intense but also aspects that many people in the nation might be thinking. He is giving air to this thought. On the other side of the coin is Emmanuel Isaac as the Syrian who is actually a Christian, trying to make his way in the world. He is just in over his head and, of course, is heavily subjected to racism and heavily at the hands of Luca. Most of the film lookz beautiful with its almost Fincher stylings but in its dramatic ones it is extremely lower in the lighting range. That part of it is reminiscent of "Collateral" especially with the Syrian's day job (and way to pay off the mobster) being as a cab driver. The movie with its music and AI cutaways as well as footage from "The 25th Hour" is an interesting mash but the aspect of how all of it will be cleared as far as copyrights (in the wash) makes it tricky to look at beyond a festival structure.
"Sweet Dreams" has a lot to say to be sure. Laoutides as Luca does take the screen in many ways and has similar looks with his five o'clock as Matthew Rhys. As the film progresses it does want to show the lurid side (and the music with its synth stylings does hark to "Scarface"). Again many of these films are great touchstones and the film does have something original to say but it can be very schizophrenic in how it does it. It all leads to a final showdown which does rectify a lot of what has been shown and paints to a resolution that shows that everything simply comes down to power and money, even in peacetime. It also reinforces that vice does make the world go around. The aspect of family approval of course is also a big theme but every one's battle must be their own. "Where Sweet Dreams Lie" is ambitious and does do new things while concurrently also copying everything that came before it. On a budget, that is interesting but the context of what is included makes it interesting to know the trajectory of such a film. That said, it is an intriguing swing nonetheless. B
By Tim Wassberg
