Lets make things clear and get this out of the way-forget the connotations that you associate with the above words because this is about as far removed from Disney as you can get.The sleeping beauty of this movie is a girl who is drugged (though not against her will) and falls into a sleeping state so that men can outlive their fantasies next to her naked body while she is unaware of what is happening- like I say, Disney this ain't.
Julia Leigh's film begins with university student Lucy (Emily Browning) taking part in a drug trial, from the opening scene of the young girl forcing a test tube down her throat, it is clear that she is willing to subject herself to a less than comfortable position to earn some extra money. As she spends time between studying and arguing with her flatmates, her cash flow problem prompts her to respond to an advert in the paper, the requirements of the role however are not entirely clear. She attends an 'interview' at a private estate where she meets the Madame of the business Clara (Rachael Blake) is told the nature of the role, to provide silver service waitressing in provocative underwear for rich clientele, and is given an abrupt and intrusive body examination. Despite the dubious circumstances , Lucy takes the job and is soon earmarked for a more intense but higher paid role, her glacier beauty and diminutive frame catching the eye of the older gentlemen. She is asked to perform the role of a metaphorical sleeping beauty, to be drugged asleep for a whole evening, to lay naked in a bed and for men to spend the night with her in that bedroom so they can act out their desires with no fear of guilt as she is comatose beside them (the one rule however is that they are forbidden to penetrate her).
Leigh's film is problematic in many ways, the most obvious one being a lack of empathy for the lead character Lucy. She is cold and distant, her beautiful but emotionless face gives nothing away and though Emily Browning (a long way away from Lemony Snicket) bares herself literally for the role of Lucy, she is as impenetrable as the character herself. This could be argued to be the point, an air of detachment must be favourable to commit to such a sordid method of work, but this stops the viewer from any connection with her plight. When we see her visit her hermit, flat bound friend Birdman who is suffering an illness (the type of which is not disclosed but hinted at alcoholism by the fact that she uses gin instead of milk on his cereal, the only way to get him to eat), this is the only time Lucy shows signs of emotion. She weeps into his arms but as their relationship is not defined and because of the previous despondency of Lucy, it is hard to illicit any emphatic connection.
The other major problem with Sleeping Beauty is what it is trying to say as a film, it is a well shot oblique piece of work but too indifferent to be effective. Initially it would appear that we are to feel that Lucy, due to her wish to better herself at university, is a exploited victim of a financial predicament but her actions do not reflect this, she displays an uncommitted disregard to her studies and when she begins working as the sleeping beauty, she does not use the money wisely, looking for accommodation she carelessly rents an overpriced unsuitable apartment in a whimsy devil may care style. Lucy also does not display any signs that her sexually degrading role shames her, she is a promiscuous young women, and while it is not a sin to be erotically forward, her brief encounters with men seem hollow and sad, this is what she seems to want but does not make her happy. As a female viewer this does not provide a feeling of womanly empowerment nor does it create a compassion for this young woman, it is an ambiguity that makes the film too misanthropic.
This said, the film is not an entirely squandered exercise. Leigh's visual style shows promise, a sparse allure akin to Michael Haneke,particularly the effective final shot which owes a debt to Haneke's feature Hidden and the setting shows a different side to contemporary Australian cinema, one that is not often seen on the screen.
Sleeping beauty is a film that will divide people, many will see it as an icy achievement but for many, like myself, they will see this as a aloof, cold affair, a fairytale that is too grimm for many tastes.
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