Review: Sleep Dealer
Published on 7th February 2017
Alex Rivera’s remarkable Sleep Dealer is one of the most original and arresting takes on the cyberpunk genre I’ve ever seen or read. Told primarily from the point of view of a poor Mexican laborer, Sleep Dealer achieves two things: One, it turns the whole cyberpunk genre on its head by bypassing the usual elite secret agent or computer hacker protagonist in favor of a far more realistic and accessible hero, and two, it demonstrates that sharp writing and intriguing character development will always make up for a low special effects budget.
19-year-old Memo Cruz (a restrained, pleasant Luis Fernando Peña), dreams of escaping his dusty, isolated Oaxaca village. The river near his village is controlled by an American multi-national corporation, as is the Mexican economy; the locals now all use US dollars. Because the corporation has dammed up the river, the villagers are forced to purchase water at inflated prices. Naturally, this arrangement has inspired considerable resentment, and has led to the rise of media-labeled “aqua-terrorists”, who have attacked and blown up dams all over Mexico. But Memo is not mixed up with these militants. He only likes to tinker with his electronics, and he has even set up a crude satellite dish on top of his cinder block hovel. While Memo’s head is stuck in the clouds, his father struggles to make a living, and teaches his son of the days before the corporation dammed up the river.
One evening, Memo is fooling around with his gear, a radio receiver that can pick up conversations all over Mexico. He boosts the power of his setup, allowing him to listen in on transmissions in the US. Unable to understand English, Memo unwittingly eavesdrops on a secret military conversation. When he hears the name of his village crackle over his headphones, he realizes he’s been detected and immediately shuts off his receiver. But of course it’s too late, and Memo has just set off a surreal chain of events.
Suffice to say Memo makes a run for the border. Here, Rivera’s futuristic vision of the US-Mexican border is astonishing and all too plausible. In the future, America still exploits cheap Mexican labor, but in a very surprising way. And Rivera also brings to ironic life the xenophobic dream of the Great Wall between the US and Mexico.
There is a wry tone to the whole enterprise, with sharp parodies of American jingoistic TV (echoes of Starship Troopers), coupled with the very frightening automation of security and the arbitrary definition of “terrorism”. The CGI effects of drone aircraft are cheesy yet still effective; the solid writing helps suspend disbelief. The future will be remote controlled if the video game wars in Iraq are any indication.
Sleep Dealer deals head on with the real effects of economic globalization and terrorist-phobia, and it is the most timely film since Children of Men. I will say without hesitation that Sleep Dealer is the best cyberpunk film since Blade Runner, and provides a brilliant counterpoint to its dreamlike predecessor. Like Blade Runner, Sleep Dealer deals in dreams, but the very real dreams of people working and suffering today to sustain the devouring, insatiable American Dream. Whatever utopian or dystopian worlds you and I create in our minds, we will still need the easily exploited to pick our crops, look after our children, and build the cityscapes that bedeck our futuristic visions.