Ya ne splyu
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DIRECTED BY: Pavel Khvaleev
FEATURING: Polina Davydova
PLOT: Two orderly researchers trap unsuspecting Russian, enacting potent operational reprogramming, neurologically.
COMMENTS: In case my subliminal message didn’t sink in, here’s an illustrative rhyme to clarify:
“T” is for “trying“, the squeamish beware;
“O” is for “overt“, showing all it dares.
“R” is for “retching“, a result that’s sought;
“T” is for “tension“, one’s throat in a knot.
“U” is for “ugly“, most violent of crimes,
“R” is for “razor“, it’s used oftentimes.
“E” is for “endless“, may blood never cease,
“P” is for “prodding“, in places liked least.
“O” is for “offal“, of the human kind,
“R” is for “rotting“, of body and mind.
“N” is for “nasty“, how it has to be–
It spells “Torture Porn”, unsettling with glee.
Like most porn, “torture porn” is an “I know it when I see it” kind of thing. In Pavel Khvaleev’s latest film, Sleepless Beauty, I saw plenty of it. Khvaleev takes cues from the Saw franchise (woman locked in room facing various “challenges”), the Dark Web franchise (a chatroom transcript springs up at intervals throughout), and the Hieronymous Bosch franchise—illustrated by an extended animation sequence that can only be described as “Boschian”. (And yes, technically there isn’t a film franchise under that Dutchman’s auspices, but hope springs eternal.)
For the most part, Sleepless Beauty is spot-on. The introduction gives the viewer enough grounding to follow what’s happening to “Mila” (a very much put-upon Polina Davydova), even if we don’t necessarily know what all this sturm und drang is storming and driving at. Joining us in our confusion is a peanut gallery of chatroom personalities who have opted to watch the web broadcast of the ordeal (on some server even TOR-ier than TOR) in pursuit of lurid thrills. Two chat-room “Admin” voices have a conversation during the feed that increasingly hints at what is actually going on.
To the extent torture porn can work, Sleepless Beauty works well. The chatroom vignettes provide some great black comedy moments. And the seemingly-unrelated framing story about a Russian ambassador nicely wraps everything together. However, whoever cast the English-dub actors should be fired from show business. This is a dark Russian movie, and one should be able to watch it and listen and hear the kind of casual fatalism that can only come from Russian actors whose Russian can be heard. The low-rent Californian-English “coming” from Mila’s somber-looking parents effectively ruins the movie every time they appear—and the less said about the C-grade vocalizations for the world-weary Russian detective, the better. I have a hunch I could give this movie “Recommended” status if I had been able to view the original language cut.
But I didn’t. If you find yourself curious at this point, seek out the subtitled version and I can all but guarantee that, if you are a fan of this genre, you will enjoy yourself tremendously, as horrible things are enacted on the protagonist-cum-test subject.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY: