HYPERSLEEP

SYNOSSI

Italy, in the near future. The overcrowded and violent prisons of the past are merely a memory: inmates now serve their sentences in a state of deep sleep that renders them harmless.

Hypersomnia is an economical and efficient system, having drastically reduced the rate of criminal recidivism. But not everything works as it should. One day, David Damiani (Stefano Accorsi), a prison psychologist, comes face to face with an aggressive inmate whose entire record has been lost. This unexpected event sets off a chain of events that forces David to confront the ghosts of his own past—and a conspiracy involving Viola, the love of his life. In the process, he discovers that nothing is quite what it seems.

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DIRECTOR'S NOTES

Hypersleep is a psychological thriller set in a dystopian future—a future not far removed from our own, an alternate present in which the old prison system, with all its problems and contradictions, has been replaced by a new and revolutionary form of incarceration based on the forced sleep of prisoners: “Hypnos,” the flagship project of a ruthless political class prone to dangerous authoritarian tendencies.

But Hypersleep is also the story of an amour fou: a passion, an obsession, and a man forced to sacrifice the love of his life on the altar of a higher cause—one on which the fate of many others depends.

The film’s narrative mechanism, shaped by a long and layered writing process, revolves around themes that have always fascinated me: the impossibility of transcending the limits of one’s perceptual horizon; the illusory nature of reality; and the silent yet pervasive impact of the more or less hidden forms of conditioning exerted by the society in which we live.

Hypersleep blends several genres: thriller, noir and science fiction—a “soft” form of science fiction, more conceptual than spectacular, far removed from the sleek, hyper-technological aesthetic of mainstream science fiction. By taking viewers on a dizzying journey through the labyrinth of its protagonist’s unconscious, the film aims to offer a surprising and emotionally charged experience in a territory still largely unexplored in contemporary Italian cinema.