Plustown A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

pointyfilippa The movie runs out of plot and jokes well before the end of a two-hour running time, long for a light comedy.

mraculeated The biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.

Sarita Rafferty There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

seymourblack-1 Thrillers in which the main protagonist is an amnesiac often provide great entertainment because it's natural to feel empathy for the victim and also to enjoy trying to solve the mystery surrounding how they arrived in their present predicament. Furthermore, by effectively being put in the shoes of the amnesiac, the audience experiences first hand all the discomforts, frustrations and doubts that come with the condition and share the natural suspicions that arise about the sincerity of the people who are closest to them. Lots of movies feature situations in which "all is not as it seems" or where characters are "not who or what they appear to be" but where there is an amnesiac involved, the scope for exploiting these types of dramatic incidences is almost endless and this is the territory that's explored, with some success in "Before I Go To Sleep".Christine Lucas (Nicole Kidman) is a 40-year-old woman who lives in a quiet part of Berkshire and wakes up each morning with no memory of who she is or the identity of the man with whom she shares her bed. She's always surprised when she looks in the mirror because, for some reason, she expects to see a woman in her twenties and then when she surveys the wall full of photos in her bathroom, sees a pictorial account of her life with her husband, Ben (Colin Firth). Each morning Ben updates her on who he and she are and explains that her memory loss is due to injuries that she suffered in a car accident about 10 years ago.Every morning, a little while after Ben has left for work, Christine receives a phone call from Dr Nasch (Mark Strong), a neuropsychologist who says he's been treating her for some time and directs her to a camera (that's located in her bedroom) in which, at his request, she's been keeping a video diary of her daily life, her thoughts and her feelings. Dr Nasch is hopeful that Christine's use of the video diary will eventually help to restore her memory and in the meetings that he has with her each day, tries to establish the extent to which she can recall the traumatic event that triggered her amnesia. She seems to show some promise of recovery when she starts to remember some brief but unconnected images from her past and some of these images are upsetting. One includes a man with a scar on his face and Dr Nasch tells her that her amnesia is the consequence of a violent attack which she was fortunate to survive.Christine doesn't know who to trust or why Dr Nasch insists that her contacts with him should be kept a secret from Ben but nevertheless, does as the Doctor requests. In one of her meetings with Nasch, Christine shows some interesting responses to being shown certain photographs and this leads to her meeting up with an old friend called Claire (Anne-Marie Duff) who ultimately supplies some information which proves to be critical to uncovering a series of important revelations and to Christine's eventual recovery."Before I Go To Sleep" is an absorbing thriller with a great set-up, an interesting story and a denouement which, although satisfactory, doesn't live up to the standard of the rest of the movie. Despite this, it's consistently compelling to watch, well-paced and played out in a series of locations that very effectively emphasize the fear, confusion and sense of isolation that Christine experiences during her ordeal.The acting performances in this stylish movie are all of a high quality with Nicole Kidman's portrayal of the troubled amnesiac standing out and Colin Firth and Mark Strong fuelling the mystery brilliantly by both being superbly enigmatic and difficult to read at various junctures. Overall, this is definitely a worthy addition to the sub-genre of psychological thrillers in which a character with amnesia is featured.

SimonJack A different twist for a plot and some good acting should have made this a rousing mystery film. Unfortunately, "Before I Go to Sleep" gives a feel from the start that what we are seeing isn't quite real. So, we just wait until and as more and more details take shape and begin to make that clear. That results in a wholly different aspect of watching a mystery. Much of the suspense shifts to simply trying to guess or wait for the suspected misleading appearance to lead to the truth. The screenplay, directing and some technical aspects of the film seem off course. Otherwise, the acting is mostly quite good. Nicole Kidman is very good as Christine, but Colin Firth seems stiff as Ben. The R rating probably comes from some graphic scenes in flashbacks of beating and bloodshed. With a solid rewrite of the script and some better sets and solid direction, this might have been a very good mystery. As is, it's just fair.

lor_ Two highly successful films I hate are "Memento" and "Groundhog Day", for wildly different reasons, but both falling way short of what I consider a good film. The atrocious "Before I Go to Sleep" blends elements of both in a disastrous fashion.Even if this film were believable (it's not) or engrossing (far from it), its use of red herrings is unforgivable. Halfway through we have a fake scene pointing guilt at our heroine's empathetic doctor, and that's immediately revealed to be a false lead. Flashback structure is irrelevant to the story, and the resolution of the mysteries leads to a sickly sentimental finish.Actors of the caliber of Kidman & Firth are attracted to such slop by virtue of challenging roles -and the challenge unfortunately derives from these roles being unplayable. On most TV series, and in traditional Hollywood during the factory system, there is either a writers' table or conference or some mechanism to sound out before shooting begins the psychology of why characters do what they do, so that an audience can believe it. Certainly viewers are naturally gullible -that is part of what cinema relies upon, but apparently no one checked or double checked whether the premise of this stupid story could hold water when dropped on the viewer in the first few expository scenes. The more complicated a thriller is, the more difficult to avoid plot holes and contradictions- even the most successful recent thriller GONE GIRL was loaded with mistakes and poor script devices during the latter reels when the fabricated story unraveled and was replaced by "what really happened". But with lousy films like "Sleep" the most basic elements are utter rubbish, right from the git go.

Lola A Keeps you curious the whole time. Real-life lessons: not all those who love you are good for you or to you. This a great example of that. When someone is violent (or even shows signs of violence), they might explain their behaviour to themselves as " I am doing this for love because its necessary' but that is NEVER never acceptable. When someone is violent, lies to you, blackmails you in the name of love, they are not loving you (lets not discuss how far away this is from Mark Manson's unconditional love). Another lesson, affairs risk everything. If Christine didn't have an affair, Mike would not have become obsessed and destroy her life forever. If you are having an affair be ready to face the reality that that men or woman will eventually blackmail you and destroy your marriage. Affairs risk everything, if you are not ready to risk stay away from one. Character analysis and development: Christine- had an affair without realising the risk that that will impose on her marriage and family. The character is not deep enough for the public to understand why she took that risk in the first place if Ben was so great. Mike- even violent people can fall in love, even those that do nor handle woman with respect fall in love, even those you are ready to do whatever it takes (lies, violence, whatever without regarding other feelings) to get what they want fall in love. Just hope that you are not one of those people they fall in love with. Because even tho they are in love, they won't spare you from the evil traits of their character. They will eventually be themselves with you. Oppressive love is not flattering. It is not even real love. Real love, the one that matters, is build on respect, support and care. Mike's character is also not deep enough to makes us understand why he behaves like he does. Acting: Both leads Nicole Kidman and Colin Firth are great, the only thing (which is maybe more a script error than an acting one) is how we see Colin Firth's character with sympathy before Christine knows he is the one who did this to her and we never suspect a thing. If a character is truly believable we should not like this character even when we have no clue he is the bad guy. Colin Firth should have gives us something be that face expressions or way of taking or whatever, to make us go like " there is something about this guy I don't like'. Plausibility: well my only comment is she can't remember for 10 years than suddenly when she sees her son in the end she does? I mean she did see her son before why was he not the breakthrough before. But I suspect that the intention was to be implied that returning to the scene where she lost her memory, helped her remember. And maybe recalling the same information for the past 2 weeks stuck in her brain this time. Storytelling: great way to tell the story, same as The Anomaly, we learn the story together with the lead. Very common for mysteries which I realised that I like this way of storytelling. One disappointment I had was that the reason why some tried to kill Christine was not as glamorous as I expected. In the beginning I was thinking maybe she knew something top secret about something super important and that's why someone wanted her dead. In the end it was just because of a weak men's cruelty .