i don't think people realize that the movies that netflix gets the rights to are movies that often don't get to the point of premiering. these are things that would end up in development or premiere hell, a lot of times. so yeah, the casts are great and the movies are usually subpar. i think anyone going into watching a movie that netflix bought the rights to needs to go in with the mindset of it being a b movie regardless of the actors that feature in it.
at least that's my personal rule, and as a result this is one of the better netflix exclusives. the acting was great, all things considered. i will say that it dragged on at certain points and the solution to the problem was pretty obvious from the start, but as someone who's had insomnia since she was four years old, i could FEEL the delirious paranoia. if you've never had sleeping issues before, this probably will feel pointless and boring. if you have, you'll feel the dread and stress the actors are putting out, trust me.
Quite good idea but awful execution.
NETFLIX's new film Awake seemed like a toned down version of Bird Box , where the whole world is now insomniac. Despite brilliant performances and barring a few thrilling moments Awake lacked a gripping screenplay. A great concept but an average execution.
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Sadly, I have to agree with the general consensus, that this was a good IDEA, very BADLY executed. Rather than taking the seed of that idea and fleshing it out with an intelligent script, they instead went to meme and trope.com and cut and pasted a bunch of stereotypical apocalyptic nonsense as far as the IMMEDIATE breakdown of society, melanin deficient, small town religious zealots, who go from zero to child sacrifice in one sermon, an escaped rapey convict who prefers a teenaged boy over a beautiful woman, and of course, the one Black good guy has to get merked before the credits roll. Jeez!
Although Gina Rodriquez did the best she could with what she was given to work with, and Ariana Greenblatt was cute and precocious as the as the last person on earth able to catch forty winks prior to assuming room temperature, the rest of the cast seemed to fall back on previous roles they have previously played. Jennifer Jason Lee as the creepy borderline sociopathic shrink, Gill bellows as the assistant to the borderline creepy sociopathic shrink, Barry Pepper as the ex dope head turned preacher waiting for his moment with a burning bush, Frances Fisher as the Mean Mom with an opioid problem (wanting her ex drug addict daughter in law to score her a "little sumpthin sumpthin", while at the same time calling her unfit for having HAD a drug problem - SMH) Lucas Hoyos is cliched as the surly teenaged son, and of course, let's not forget Shamier Anderson as the soon to be on the wrong side of the dirt P.O.C..
If you pay attention you'll know what the solution to their problem is in the first 10 minutes or so of the film. If you don't get it then, not to worry, they TELEGRAPH it 10 minutes before the big "eureka" moment, just to make sure they completely drained all the drama and suspense out of the reveal.
If you've got nothing else on the burner, and just need something to pass the evening, then this might be the glass of warm milk you need to help you fall asleep, unlike the folks in this movie.
Horrible! Bad acting and poorly executed..
WTH!?! I am dumbfounded I hope 2022 will be a year of better movies. This is just ridiculous!
It’s got a good cast with some average acting and i did like the idea behind it but i felt it was too rushed and the plot was all over the place and didn’t make any sense at times and also a little pointless so definitely needed improvements.
I’d be willing to bet this was written by an insomniac. Interesting premise. Good performances. Gina Rodriguez may be the attraction but Ariana Greenblatt is the stand out star, as she has been and will be most of her career. Beside the performances of Rodriguez and Greenblatt, there is nothing special about this movie. It does, however, leave itself with a real sequel issue at the end. I give this film a 6 (fair) out of 10. [Post-apocalyptic Thriller]
The movie has good ideas but don't develop them as it should, I think something in the script is missing... The actors did a good job principally Gina and Ariana, congrats to them.
Who in their right mind thought this was a good idea to invest in? If Netflix keeps making garbage like this, it’s the end of the streaming service.
Like all movies with nice plot made by Netflix: poor execution, waste of talented actors.
Very disappointed. I was intrigued with the idea but it just felt flat.
I was intrigued with the concept of the film when i saw the trailer and were actually waiting for it to be released... now i know why Netflix released it mid week.. it's horribly put together.. after one night they knew the whole planet not able to sleep,ok i will let it pass.
People suddenly all going mad in the same time and shooting each other at the end,nope not working...
The answer is to have a near death experience,nope hate it..
And all the weird tests they were doing for days they haven't figured it out and the kids did!!
It could have been better. The whole thing could've been more developed and the ending got me thinking: "why not explore this in a deeper and more interesting way?"
2 stars because of the young girl in the movie. She’s a great actress and I’m glad she’s still doing great things. But boy howdy this movie was boring. Very flat and slow and just plain not good.
What an exceptionally stupid ending. You're telling me that in the entire world FOR A WEEK, nobody else was brought back from dying? Nobody was able to see the connection? Only this dumb kid?
Good movie, great suspense. Not too long. Well worth a watch :thumbsup_tone1:
Expected this to be an usual Netflix movie, but it really exceled my expectations. almost no plot holes and definitely not stupid
Interesting premise, poor execution.
Apocalyptic settings are ripe opportunities for creativity, but this seemed to lack it entirely.
I would’ve loved to see more on the effects of sleep deprivation, but an all-out military rampage seems to be all we see (aside from sleepy faces).
I was left feeling unsure whether this film was more so to do with an electrical outage or sleep deprivation, as we are shown more effects of the former, despite the film’s title.
In my opinion, this film would’ve had better potential if the electrical outage had been left out entirely and the sleep deprivation was focused on instead. Maybe more creativity would’ve been encouraged.
Humanity's internal clock got scramble; it needed to be turned off, then back on again.
Entertaining enough to sit through and not feel like it dragged unnecessarily, but not especially good either. It felt suitably engaging in parts and then super B movie awful in others. All in all I cannot recommend it but you could do worse w 80 mins if you're feeling a lower budget disaster type flick. 5.2 for me.
Cool premise, clunky execution like others have said. It was entertaining, just disjointed as far as story flow goes. Some great camera shots though.
I didn't like it one bit... Started out OK but I didn't know what was going on and the ending was horrible!
Awful. I struggled to get to the end. Another Netflix fail
Dull as fucking dirty dishwater.
Awake is the poorly written glossy magazine article you ball up and stick in the tip of a shoe to make it fit.
You know the shit's bad when not even Gina Rodriguez can save it.
Interesting idea but bad story and ending. The solution was obvious for the fewer from when the incident happened. They could have gone further.
Movie started of decent though immediately disliked the main character; Jill. I saw the trailer a while back and was excited to watch this because the idea of an incident that causes people to not sleep anymore sounded interesting but man the execution was poor at best. The characters are all but Dodge very unlikable, even those kids. Sorry. When they arrive at the Hub it is immediately clear to me that the other women who can sleep has died and been brought back so I assumed from thereon out that this is the same for the girl and honestly for a bunch of clever scientist, how did they not catch that? When they started the research they weren't 'that' tired yet. Then the sleep expert (or as I just like to call her, the mom van Atypical) tries to explain what happened (poorly) with a 'we think solar flares'. We think?! They couldn't explain this away so they gave some sort of vague answer AND then the girl figures out what I had already found out when her brother dies and comes back so they take mommy to a effing lake, drown her and bring her back when they could've just zapped her with the defibrillator... you know why be so dramatic about it? Could've also brought Dodge back with the defibrillator and maybe some of the others who hilariously got killed over a pine cone. So the punchline is basically 'have you tried turning it off and on again' human edition. I can't.
Storytelling was weak, not backed up by any science which would've been fine if they hadn't tried to put this on Solar flames. If they went with I don't know, aliens... it could've been okay. Aliens give unlimited creative freedom but if you want to add science to a movie you better explain it decently.
While admittedly, this isn't a great movie, I didn't think it was so bad. I must have been in a very open and receptive mood when I watched it.
Some massive EMP type event wipes out everything electrical. As if this isn't bad enough, it seems to have also disrupted electrical signals in people's brains making sleep impossible for everyone except an old lady and a child. The lack of sleep makes everyone quickly succumb to psychosis, some more quickly than others. Chaos ensues.
What I liked most about this movie was Gina Rodriguez's character. Movies have the ridiculous practice of making any character who spent any time in the military into an unrealistically amazing badass no matter what their job was in the military. But in this movie Gina Rodriguez's character was a badass of a different type. I found this character be quite admirable. Rather than being a female Rambo or John Wick, she was simply a strong, tough, tenacious, quick-thinking, and level-headed woman. I found this to be much more believable and refreshing.
stopped watching after like 20 min. The beginning was fine, but then it just got plain boring :/
Half an hour was too much of this idiotic mess for me
Terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible.... repeat a dozen more times and you'll get it.... if what happens in this movie in the real world, just watch this movie and you'll instantly fall asleep....
Suputamadre !! they should have just watched this movie and problem fixed
I like the premise, but this was such a missed opportunity. You could do so much with the idea of how lack of sleep affects the human brain and it could be so terrifying. Instead, they did this. So sad.
they cant sleep I cant stay awake watching this movie...
So-so movie about what would happen if no one could sleep and how they'd lose their minds as their brain can't function after a number of days. Problem is, most of the people they meet are either zombies or semi-normal within just a day or two, but others function pretty normal, without the urge to kill people.
It's an interesting, but not a riveting movie - if there's nothing else on, then watch it. If you never see it, you'll miss nothing.
5/10
The concept behind the movie was interesting but it was poorly executed, rushed and just went nowhere.
The movie isn't bad, it's just very, very predictable.
I knew the solution just in the moment everything goes down and shit starts to happen.
It was too obvious from my perpective.
i hate noah and i hate movie with dumbfuck teen
Paladin5150 does a great review. The only curve I want th throw is that if everyone is sleep deprived, they are going to have to act stupid.
The basic premise of the movie is pretty good - but the execution is lacking This story needed to be fleshed out a lot more. Once again a limited series would have been more appropriate.
How I rate:
1-3 :heart: = seriously! don't waste your time
4-6 :heart: = you may or may not enjoy this
7-8 :heart: = I expect you will like this too
9-10 :heart: = movies and TV shows I really love!
Disappointing. The director made the engaging Kodachrome but he has missed the mark here. It hops from one scene to the next with little coherency, especially at the beginning when people start turning on each other with little explanation. Whole chunks of storyline seemed to be missing so perhaps it was edited badly. Who knows, but if you struggle with insomnia, this film might put you to sleep.
Shout by CashBlockedParent2021-06-10T13:55:07Z
The premise of the film is people can't sleep, the challenge from the director is to try and stay awake, it's genius.