If nothing else, this fine debut feature from Korean director Jason Yu – hitherto assistant director to Bong Joon-ho – counts as a small masterpiece of tone. It begins in the area of domestic comedy. A young couple worry over the husband’s erratic sleeping patterns while a downstairs neighbour frets about the noise above. Then suggestions of a supernatural cause build. We end in a state of deliciously escalating ambiguity. Such films hope audiences leave arguing about the meaning of what they have just seen, and I can confirm that such binary divisions are possible. My companion and I were politely at opposite ends of the argument. Sleep will certainly reward second and third viewing.
Set almost entirely within one apartment building, the picture makes a few good-natured gestures towards Rosemary’s Baby. Like John Cassavetes in that film, Hyun-su (Lee Sun-kyun) is an actor struggling with indifferent work opportunities. Like Mia Farrow’s character, Soo-jin (Jung Yu-mi) is pregnant and, as the oddities gather, increasingly worried about the weird world into which the baby will be born. Those connections are, however, largely superficial. Sleep is lighter on its feet and more at home to rug-pulling humour.
Early on, while asleep, Hyun-su blurts out the words “Someone is inside”. Soo-jin hears noises elsewhere in the flat, but discovers nothing more sinister than a door banging in the wind. Her husband shows more signs of sleep disorder: he scratches his face violently; he sleepwalks to the fridge and wolfs down raw meat. We are eventually confronted with two explanations. A doctor sees this as an REM condition and recommends medication. Soo-jin’s mother calls in a psychic – a no-sense sort with little exotic mumbo jumbo – who decides that a spirit is present in the apartment. Could it be that of the jealous older man who used to live downstairs?
As we move into a third act, the peril has as much to do with Soo-jin’s growing paranoia as it does with any fears of a genuine haunting. Initially sceptical, she is soon convinced that supernatural perils lurk in every broom cupboard. We end with a hectic denouement that satisfies all desire for catharsis as it makes an art of creative doubt spreading. A fine chamber piece.
