(Quand je ne dors pas) The neo-Nouvelle Vague “Sleepless Night In Paris” is Andrew Bujalski-meets-Leos Carax by way of François Truffaut’s “The 400 Blows,” Tommy Weber’s nocturnal black-and-white streets-of-Paris debut feature. (The title is drawn from a Petula Clark song, “The Night is Endless.”) Scrappy, hardly-old-enough-to-shave Antoine (Aurélien Gabrielli) doesn’t have the money for a train ticket, so he spends the night ahead trying to scrape up the euros he needs. Some encounters are rote for a young romantic male hero (especially a French one), others alive to the moment, tickling toward poetry, and the silken cinematography swaddles all. It’s a sweet, modest breath. With Elise Lhomeau, Hortense Gélinet, Jacques Weber, Stanley Weber, Antoine Reinartz, Mohamed Kerriche. 82m. (Ray Pride)
“Sleepless Night In Paris” is a U.S. premiere and opens Friday, July 15 at Facets.
Ray Pride is Newcity’s Senior Editor and Film Critic. He is a contributing editor of Filmmaker magazine.
Ray’s history of Chicago Ghost Signs is planned for publication next year. Previews of the project are on Twitter and on Instagram. More photography on Instagram.
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