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I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

I found this for me unknown flick at a sell-out of a rental shop. Somehow it attracted me and let me say this, I didn't regret it. The main lead and for most part in visual is Jeff Daniels. He already had a lot of movies but none of them was made for me. It was with a bit of fear that I plugged it in just to see an average thriller or maybe a horror. Let me tell you it's not average. It's a superb performance by Daniels. Chasing Sleep was also the work of Michael Walker writer and director. And being his first full feature well he's someone to look forward to. But 10 years later he's still hasn't made another flick, well, one in post-production...The movie isn't really made for everybody. It's a slow story but every minute works. You can guess what's going on but again, slowly the story evolves. And the camera work is also slowly, wide-angle slowly zooming in. Some parts did remind me of David Lynch. The weirdness of the story. Every actor is so believable. The fragility of Sadie (Emily Bergl). I really enjoyed it from the first second until the end credits. You are really into it from the beginning. I wasn't 'chasing sleep' while watching it.

Too bad that Jeff Daniels, an excellent actor, can't get better parts. He showed so much promise as Shirley MacLaine's son-in-law in "Terms of Endearment." Come on, Hollywood. You can do better than this for Mr. Daniels.Daniels is a college professor here who finds that his wife, a music teacher, is missing. He alternately hallucinates due to a lack of sleep. He even dreams that his wife has been found dead. Maybe, this is wishful thinking on his part.We discover that the Mrs. has been having an affair with a gym teacher in her school and is pregnant. To add to the mayhem, a student, named Sadie Crumb, comes over to find out why the college professor hasn't been showing up to class. When Daniels doesn't show up for 2 days, his response to the college secretary, calling to tell him that the dean wants to see him, is memorable.What should the police believe when they find Sadie's bloody clothing on the scene? Incidentally, she had a nosebleed while at the professor's house.Daniels spends most of the time in this movie in the toilet wiping away blood and possible body parts. This is mainly where the script should have placed as well.

IMHO, I think a lot of people have missed the point to this movie. What it's really about is how much trouble you can get in if you don't take care of your plumbing properly. Remember that Eve comments in her diary that Ed has been acting strangely for quite a while - this is clearly due to the unbearable burden of his plumbing problems which he is not able to handle, and which eventually drive him crazy. The murder of his wife, her unborn child, all the hallucinations, and finally the attempted suicide with all those pills - all because he didn't consult a licensed plumber in time. And on one level, of course, Ed knows this, and it is his tremendous guilt at not taking proper care of his pipes that drives him over the edge. He even anthropomorphizes his plumbing, resulting in all that blood pouring out of everywhere. (This analysis may even give one reason to reevaluate what's really happening in "The Shining".) Never have I seen a movie that so effectively drives home the importance of good plumbing maintenance.This movie should be a warning to us all.

As one who loves "different" movies, such as Memento, I hated Chasing Sleep, especially the way they ended it. I felt that the ending made the movie a total waste of time for me. Also, the crawling finger and large baby were ridiculous and took away from the quality of this psychological thriller. I add it to the long list of "could have been a good movie".