We rented the film Waking Life over the weekend and were sorely disappointed. The animation technique employed is actually quite fascinating, but on the whole, the film left a lot to be desired.

First of all, we had the silly expectation that the film would have a plot. Second, we believed there would be something of a consistent visual look to the animation, so that characters are recognizable from scene to scene. The choppy incoherence might have made the film more fun for the animators--each obviously given license to do their own style in a given scene--but it makes for tedious watching.

The script seems like a poor attempt to be profound, giving random samplings of world views of benighted postmoderns and other poor schmucks of our day mired down in a moral and epistimological quagmire. Scene after scene, the protagonist wanders into conversations with various individuals who spout bankrupt philosophies. It struck me as being forced to sit up all night listening to sophomore philosophy majors jabber on and on inventing crackpot theories.

In no sense is any hopefulness expressed about our lives having meaning. The theories and stories the protagonist hears as he wanders in a dream state serve only to clarify that his waking life is an illusion. He is trapped in this existence of passivity from which he cannot wake.

I have not in a long time seen such a loud cry for help from a God who loves, who cherishes, who enlivens and fills his people with meaning and purpose.