Waking Life is a 2001 American animated film written and directed by Richard Linklater. The film explores a wide range of philosophical issues, including the nature of reality, dreams and lucid dreams, consciousness, the meaning of life, free will, and existentialism.

To create the visual effect, Linklater used an animation technique based on rotoscoping, in which animators overlaid the live-action footage shot by Linklater with animation that roughly approximates the images actually filmed.

“It’s like you come onto this planet with a crayon box. Now you may get the 8 pack, you may get the 16 pack but it’s all in what you do with the crayons, the colors, that you’re given. Don’t worry about coloring within the lines or coloring outside the lines. I say color outside the lines, you know what I mean? Color all over the page. Don’t box me in!"

“In short, I think the message here is that we should never write ourselves off or see each other as a victim of various forces. It’s always our decision who we are.”

So much of what we perceive cannot be expressed. It’s unspeakable. And yet you know, when we communicate with one another and we feel that we have connected and we think that we’re understood I think we have a feeling of almost spiritual communion. And that feeling might be transient, but I think it’s what we live for.

“Resistance is not futile, we’re gonna win this thing, humankind is too good, we’re not a bunch of under-achievers! We’re gonna stand up, and we’re gonna be human beings. We’re going to get fired up about the real things, the things that matter! Creativity, and the dynamic human spirit that refuses to submit.”