Director – Richard Linklater

George Santayana said: “Sanity is a madness put to good uses; waking life is a dream controlled.” One of the persistent teachings of the spiritual masters is that our waking life – the life in which we walk, talk, think, eat, go to the office, marry, bring up children – is actually a dream. Even though we think we awake from sleep, we are actually day dreaming in our waking life. All our goals, ambitions, memories are simply a common dream. When one realizes this, there is the possibility of further waking up to the ultimate reality beyond time and space.

The film Waking Life is a unique film in many respects. It is a digitally enhanced live-action rotoscoped film. Everything is shaking and fuzzy as if in a dream. The story is about a young man who is in a continuous dream like consciousness – he keeps waking up from one dream but finds himself in another one like the layers of an onion. In his dreams, he meets other characters and discusses with them philosophical issues such as free will, relationships, existentialism, and so on.

I must say that you will need tremendous energy to watch this film – my most favorite mystical movie.