Woody Allen's "Miles Monroe" goes into the hospital for routine surgery and wakes up 200 years later where eating hot fudge sundaes and smoking cigarettes is good for you.  Having slept through the apocalypse, Miles wakes up with his neurosis still in tact. The world is now an impersonal police state, where curious men of science, with no sense of humor or humanity, ply him for information about the long-forgotten past.  The classic comedy, Sleeper, offers a re-programmed elite French like upper class, a pack of rebels called "the underground" and the Leader's Keystone cops chasing around the alien from Greensburg Village, NY.

Director and star Allen's future world is as typically nuts as his present, with the added comforts of home, such as finding an ancient rusted VW that starts right up and the forever lasting golden arches of McDonalds.  Allen brings his brilliant comedy to every scene of the movie.  When asked to interpret archaeological artifacts from the 1970's, "Miles" identifies Bela Lugosi as the mayor of New York and Charles DeGaulle as a famous French chef.  Video tapes of a bellicose Howard Cossell are explained away as a torture device used on the most brutal prisoners.

As in many of his other movies,  the funny looking little guy is the hero and gets the girl.  This classic is worth a yearly viewing and even possibly a re-make, but I don't even think Woody Allen could do justice to this great film again. 

Doug Whittle is Senior Director of Development at Fuller Theological Seminary.  He is an American Baptis ordained minister and an avid movie lover.