|
 |
|
Vanilla Sky
***
Cinema Releases - January 25, 2002
Rated on a 4-star scale. Certificate 15. 135
minutes. Written and directed by Cameron Crowe; based on the movie "Abre
Los Ojos" written by Alejandro Amenabar, Mateo Gill. Starring Tom Cruise,
Penelope Cruz, Cameron Diaz, Jason Lee, Kurt Russell, Noah Taylor, Timothy
Spall.
Cameron Crowe has made some of the best films
of recent years dealing with down-to-earth emotions, including "Say Anything"
and "Almost Famous". "Vanilla Sky" is a strange and interesting
choice for the director -- it's a challenging, dreamlike thriller about a
character who doesn't know what he's feeling, what he should be feeling or
what the hell is going on in his life.
Tom Cruise stars as a thirtysomething magazine
publisher who has achieved such success that Steven Spielberg shows up at
his birthday party and Courtney Love has trouble getting him on the phone.
His best friend, played by Jason Lee, is a struggling bohemian writer who
Cruise has known since childhood, and that's about his closest relationship.
He sleeps with a society gal played by Cameron Diaz sometimes, but thinks
it's pretty clear that there's no emotional involvement.
Diaz, we learn, doesn't feel too comfortable about
the idea of emotionless sex; she takes Cruise on an out-of-control car journey
and shouts, "When you sleep with someone, your body makes a promise whether
you do or not!" The car crashes, and when Cruise wakes up, he learns that
Diaz is dead and his own face has been destroyed.
This is all told in flashback, from a cell in
which Cruise is being examined by a prison psychiatrist. He's been charged
with murder -- whose, we're not told, but then Crowe tells us very little
of anything. The more ground the flashbacks cover, the less we're sure of...
Did Cruise's face remain scarred, or has he had reconstructive surgery? Did
he really have a romance with Lee's girlfriend, an artist played by Penelope
Cruz, and if so, was she really who she appeared to be? Did Cruise really
murder someone, or was there no murder at all? And is his fragmented memory
and confused psyche the result of a dream, a problem of perception or some
kind of conspiracy?
"Vanilla Sky" is based on a Spanish movie called
"Open Your Eyes", which opened in Britain two years ago to much acclaim.
It was a tense, frustrating mind-game that I compared to being tickled --
"horrible as well as enjoyable, but worth it for that moment of relief when
the tickler finally stops". "Vanilla Sky" does not have the same effect;
it's slicker then the original, missing its otherworldly aura, and content
to play on our curiosity rather than penetrate our imaginations. The movie
is also too long, and features clumsy closing moments with over-the-top
montages.
Nonetheless, this is an intriguing and entertaining
film, the kind of thing that hardly ever gets financed by major Hollywood
studios. Instead of a formula we get a story that keeps unfolding, and instead
of chatter that drives the plot forward we have dialogue referring to things
important to the characters. Cruise is a strong choice for the lead role
-- we're so used to seeing him as a nice guy that this character's bitter,
twisted mood swings have quite an effect. And the film's opening shot, featuring
a bewildered Cruise tumbling through a completely empty Times Square, will
be remembered as one of the great logistical achievements of filmmaking
history.
COPYRIGHT©
2002 Ian Waldron-Mantgani
2002 Reviews
(alphabetical)
2002 Reviews (by star
rating)
Archive of all cinema reviews
(alphabetical)
Review Archive
Index
UK
Critic main page
|
|
![[Image]](http://www.ukcritic.com/posbanr2.gif)