Slipstream - 2007

Strand Releasing, Destination Films, Samson Films

Written and Directed by Anthony Hopkins

Cast:

• Bonhoeffer – Anthony Hopkins
• Bonnie – S. Epatha Merkerson
• Lily – Lana Antonova
• Gina – Stella Arroyave
• Mort / Phil Henderson / Patrolman - Michael Clarke Duncan
• Bette Lustig – Fionnula Flanagan
• Barbara – Camryn Manheim
• Himself – Kevin McCarthy
• Ray / Matt Dobbs / Patrolman – Christian Slater
• Geek / Jeffy / Dr. Geekman – Jeffrey Tambor
• Harvey Brickman – John Turturro

Story: An actor and would-be screenwriter, who at the very moment of his meeting with Fate, comes to discover that life is random and fortune is sightless. He is thrown into a vortex where time, dreams, and reality collide in an increasingly whirling slipstream. It's a surreal and dreamlike tale of one man's journey. Written by Gregg Brilliant (borrowed from IMDb)

Review: What goes through a screenwriter's mind? When does everything merge into everything else and become one huge canvas where you can draw from everything at once? This is the premise, I gather, of the film. Anthony Hopkins has written and directed a stream of consciousness surreal film that allows us, the viewer, to evaluate the actions and scenes for what they mean, which could be something or nothing at all. The casting of the film is brilliant, with Christian Slater, Jeffrey Tambor, S. Epatha Merkerson, and others too numerous to mention all giving a performance of lifetime in a film which really doesn't have a plot at all. Is this the movie that flashes before one's eyes at the moment of transition? Rated R for language and some violence, this is definitely not for the timid or the weak, and certainly not one for the Entertainment Tonight set. Don't get me wrong, I like to be entertained as much as the next guy, but watching Slipstream is more like attending a showing of Dali's paintings or reading a Virginia Woolf novel. This one gets into your head. Collectible like the volumes of Shakespeare you have on your shelf, you have to open your mind to the possibilities.