Sleeping Dogs

2006

Bobcat Goldthwait

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“Everybody has a secret. What’s yours?”  asks the tagline for the new film from Bobcat Goldthwait (best known to the world for his classic display as Zed in the Police Academy franchise), Sleeping Dogs. The film is a cheeky and slightly twisted romantic comedy, breathing new life into a much trodden and often rubbish genre. It’s easy to see how rom-com’s serve a valuable purpose with their life-affirming sweetness, however, as is often the case, Hollywood has churned out uninspiring efforts one after the other and given the genre a bad name — we can generally only expect formulaic insipidness coupled with a couple of ‘above the title’ big names. However, Goldthwait and his team have taken a small budget and crafted a work which shows a genuine inventiveness, twisting the plot up with an adult sensibility and frivolous disregard which creates moment after moment of actual comedy — there is a real focus on the comedy part of romantic comedy (as you would expect from a comedian director) — and still remaining endearingly heartwarming.

It’s all about secrets, as the tagline would suggest, or rather one particular secret. Although pointing out how we all have them, Amy (Melinda Page Hamilton — Sister Mary Bernard from Desperate Housewives), the protagonist, has one which is rather special — I’m not going to reveal what this is, but you wont have to wait long to find out when you go and see the film for yourself. ‘Special’ means it’s going to make you laugh, however, its effect on her own life is far less than positive. Amy’s situation is seemingly perfect, a loving fiancee (John — Bryce Johnson) and doting parents (played by Geoffrey Pierson and Bonita Friedericy) but this is all to change… The film carefully delves into real issues and questions how our interpersonal relationships can be dramatically effected by whichever way you make your decisions, delivering moments of both comic and emotional intensity along the way.

Goldthwait’s style offers some incredibly funny, and incredibly adult, moments.

Melinda Page Hamilton performs the lead perfectly, playing an engaging and identifiable character, very easy to like. She is similarly surrounded by light easy performances from the mostly television-actor cast — with notable performances from Colby French (who plays her workmate Ed) and Geoffrey Pierson — who comes on a little like Ben Gazzara in Buffalo ‘66, but with a heart of gold instead of a surreal nastiness. Some of the big comic turns are down to the efforts at social interaction from Amy’s older brother Dougie (Jack Plotnick) and his friend Randy (Brian Posehn) including Dougie’s bedtime meth-fulled sampling keyboard sessions, and Randy’s attempts at normal conversation whilst making a jigsaw or bringing round some casserole his mother made.

Sleeping Dogs is a welcome change from the majority of boring rom-coms out there. It does look and feel like an indie made on a budget but it is well done and it all kind of adds to its endearingness. It offers exactly what you want from a film of its genre but also offers something different and Goldthwait’s style offers some incredibly funny, and incredibly adult, moments — no wonder it was termed “the most insane romantic comedy of the year” by none other than John Waters; he liked it, and you might too.

Check out the trailer on the links below:

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