Vanilla Sky

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For the Italian band, see Vanilla Sky (band).
Vanilla Sky

Theatrical release poster
Directed by Cameron Crowe
Produced by Cameron Crowe
Tom Cruise
Paula Wagner
Written by Alejandro Amenábar
Mateo Gil
Cameron Crowe
Starring Tom Cruise
Penélope Cruz
Cameron Diaz
Jason Lee
Kurt Russell
Editing by Joe Hutshing
Distributed by Paramount Pictures
Release date(s) December 14, 2001
Running time 136 min.
Country United States
Language English
Budget US$68,000,000[1]
Allmovie profile
IMDb profile

Vanilla Sky (2001) is an American psychological thriller film, which has been variously characterized by published film critics as "an odd mixture of science fiction, romance, and reality warp",[2] "part Beautiful People fantasy, part New Age investigation of the Great Beyond"[3] a "love story, a struggle for the soul, or an existential confrontation with the eternal",[4] and an "erotic adventure, romance, comedy, mystery and psychological thriller, with a dose of science fiction".[5]

The film is a "very close remake"[6] of the 1997 Spanish film Abre los ojos (Open Your Eyes), which was written by Alejandro Amenábar and Mateo Gil. It stars Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz, Penélope Cruz (a reprise of her performance in Abre los ojos), Jason Lee, and Kurt Russell. It was directed by Cameron Crowe, who produced the film together with Cruise and Paula Wagner, and Cruise/Wagner Productions.

Contents

[edit] Plot

The film opens with David Aames (Tom Cruise) waking up in bed. As he drives to work, he finds the streets of New York strangely deserted at rush hour. With growing unease he drives to Times Square and finds the entire city abandoned. He then awakens in his bedroom once again to realize he's only been having a vivid dream.

Cut to: David in a jail cell describing a dream to Dr. Curtis McCabe (Kurt Russell), a psychologist who has been assigned to him. David has been charged with a murder he cannot remember, and he wears a mysterious pale mask. He and Dr. McCabe discuss the events that led to his eventual incarceration. Following the death of David's father, he was given 51% ownership of his father's publishing company. The rest of the company is owned by a board of directors that David disparagingly calls the "Seven Dwarfs." Each of them believed that he was next in line to take over the company after David's father died. David can have anything his heart desires, and nothing is beyond him.

On the night of his birthday party which also includes a conversation with a drunken Thomas Tipp (Timothy Spall), the company attorney and an old friend of David's father, David considered firing Thomas for what he believes is his incompetence as an attorney, but he has a change of heart when Thomas makes a sad confession.

David's best friend, Brian Shelby (Jason Lee), brings with him a girl named Sofia Serrano (Penelope Cruz) whom he just met at the library. Almost instantly, David and Sofia flirt with each other, almost completely ignoring Brian. However, Julianna Gianni (Cameron Diaz), a regular bed partner for whom David has no deep feelings, crashes his party. She stays distant but keeps a close eye on him the entire night. Once David realizes Julianna is there, he asks Sofia to pretend to engage in a deep conversation with him so that Julianna won't come near him. David and Sofia end up hitting it off. David walks Sofia back to her place, where they stay up all night talking.

The next morning as David is getting ready to drive to work, Julianna drives up beside him asking how his night with Sofia was. Julianna makes David feel guilty about ignoring her and convinces him to get into her car. It quickly becomes apparent that she is obsessed with David. She starts driving recklessly, speeding through busy city streets, all the while insisting that she's deeply in love with him and berating him for treating her so casually. Fearing for their safety, he tries to get her to stop the car by telling her that he loves her. She drives the car off a bridge in an attempt to kill them both.

Julianna did not survive the crash. David did, however, although his face and right arm are mangled, and he suffers blinding headaches due to the metal pieces holding his skull together. He spends a long time in isolation before deciding to take back control of his company and see Sofia again. She appears hesitant to be around him, and when they go on a date she brings Brian along. The date is a disaster as David drinks too much and makes Sofia increasingly uneasy around him. The three part ways at the end of the night, and David ends up passing out on a sidewalk. It is morning when Sofia wakes him up at that same exact spot and tells him that she will stay with him if he can get his act together. From that moment on, David's life is turned around. His team of plastic surgeons is able to restore his face and he finds his soul mate in Sofia.

David's new-found happiness is short-lived, however, when he begins hallucinating. He looks in the mirror to see his face once again disfigured. A mysterious man turns up wherever he goes and tells David that he has the power to control the world. And one night he goes to bed with Sofia and wakes up to find himself with Julianna, who insists she really is Sofia. He grows violent, convinced that Julianna is alive and playing games with him. He is arrested and told by Tipp that he severely beat Sofia, but Tipp will have the case thrown out. Tipp shows David photos of Julianna with a bruised face, but everybody, including his best friend Brian, tells him that it was Sofia he attacked.

David breaks into Sofia's apartment and finds that every photo he'd seen of Sofia is now of Julianna. Julianna attacks him thinking he's an intruder but then apologizes while still insisting she is Sofia. She leaves the room and the actual Sofia returns in her place as if nothing unusual had happened. They begin to make love but while they are in the middle of the act he finds that he is making love to Julianna. In a fit of panic he suffocates her and then discovers he has just killed Sofia.

When David is finished telling Dr. McCabe his story he still can't bring himself to believe that he killed anybody. Dr. McCabe, frustrated by David's failure to tell him anything meaningful that might help his case, tells him that he can no longer help David and will try to argue for "temporary derangement". This odd turn of legalistic phrase is just one of many clues that in this version of David's world all is not what it seems. As Dr. McCabe leaves, David sees an infomercial for a cryonics company called "Life Extension." This infomercial involving a dog that has been frozen and brought back to life has appeared at several points throughout the film. David is entranced by the commercial, and McCabe sees that there may be a connection between Life Extension and David's amnesia.

Escorted by Dr. McCabe and Police, David visits Life Extension and realizes that he had signed on as a client. He had opted for an extra feature called the Lucid Dream. This allows cryogenically-frozen, clinically dead clients to experience an unending custom-made dream life with no memory of their physical death.

David realizes that he is now living in the Lucid Dream and that the mysterious man is his "Technical Support." The Support Technician explains that the Lucid Dream was "spliced" into his memories at the point where he passed out on the sidewalk after his night out with Sofia and Brian. But the dream went awry and turned into a nightmare. Since nothing he experienced after the splice was real David realizes that he never murdered anybody. Dr. McCabe tells him that the guilt he felt for the way he treated Julianna may have caused his subconscious to merge Julianna and Sofia. But it turns out that Dr. McCabe isn't real either; he's just a character David created in his dream to be the father figure he always wanted. Most curious is the fact that Dr. McCabe seems to believe that he himself is real and only reluctantly comes to accept the truth (he had previously mentioned that he was going out with his two daughters for dinner after a session with David, but when The Support Technician asks him "What are their [your daughters'] names, Dr. McCabe has no response). Tech Support tells David that in reality, he never saw Sofia again, and that Thomas Tipp, the attorney that David considered firing in the beginning, had saved the company for David and helped him regain control from the board of directors. But David, suffering constant pain and depression following his disfigurement, committed suicide.

In the end, Technical Support reveals an upgrade to the software which allows David to either be reinserted into the lucid dream with no memory of the nightmare portion or to be awakened in the present time (which is 150 years after he was frozen) and live in the real world with a restored body. David chooses to be awakened in this future present realizing that everyone he ever knew will be long dead and his wealth will be worth far less. After one last lucid-dream rooftop exchange with Sofia in which she vows to "find you again" he leaps off the skyscraper. Multiple memory-images cascade frenetically through his mind as he falls. The final shot is of a brief whiteout (rather than the blackout) accompanied by the sound of a woman's voice telling him to "open your eyes" and an extreme closeup of a single human eye opening and staring into the camera.

[edit] Cast

[edit] Interpretations

According to Cameron Crowe's commentary, there are four different interpretations of the ending:

  • "Tech support" is telling the truth; 150 years have passed since David Aames killed himself, and everything after his passing out on the sidewalk was a lucid dream.
  • The entire movie is a dream, as evidenced by the sticker on David's car that reads '2/30/01' (30 February doesn't occur in the Gregorian calendar).
  • The entire movie after the crash is a dream that takes place while David is in a coma.
  • The entire movie is the plot to the book that Brian is writing.

The title is a reference to depictions of skies in some of the paintings of Claude Monet; Crowe has noted that the presence of "vanilla skies" identifies the first Lucid Dream scene (morning reunion after club scene); all that follows is dream.[7]

[edit] Reception

While the film grossed around 100 million dollars in U.S. box office,[1] many of the reviews were mixed.[8] Roger Ebert's print review gave it three out of four stars:

Think it all the way through, and Cameron Crowe's Vanilla Sky is a scrupulously moral picture. It tells the story of a man who has just about everything, thinks he can have it all, is given a means to have whatever he wants, and loses it because — well, maybe because he has a conscience. Or maybe not. Maybe just because life sucks. Or maybe he only thinks it does. This is the kind of movie you don't want to analyze until you've seen it two times.

Ebert said that the ending "explains the mechanism of our confusion, rather than telling us for sure what actually happened."[9] Richard Roeper greatly enjoyed the film and has put it in his list for Best Films for 2001 at #2.

A more mixed review from The New York Times (NYT) early on calls the film a "highly entertaining, erotic science-fiction thriller that takes Mr. Crowe into Steven Spielberg territory" but then notes:

As it leaves behind the real world and begins exploring life as a waking dream (this year's most popular theme in Hollywood movies with lofty ideas), Vanilla Sky loosens its emotional grip and becomes a disorganized and abstract if still-intriguing meditation on parallel themes. One is the quest for eternal life and eternal youth; another is guilt and the ungovernable power of the unconscious mind to undermine science's utopian discoveries. David's redemption ultimately consists of his coming to grips with his own mortality, but that redemption lacks conviction.[10]

A negative review was published by Salon.com, which called the film an "aggressively plotted puzzle picture, which clutches many allegedly deep themes to its heaving bosom without uncovering even an onion-skin layer of insight into any of them."[11] The review rhetorically asks:

Who would have thought that Cameron Crowe had a movie as bad as "Vanilla Sky" in him? It's a punishing picture, a betrayal of everything that Crowe has proved he knows how to do right....But the disheartening truth is that we can see Crowe taking all the right steps, the most Crowe-like steps, as he mounts a spectacle that overshoots boldness and ambition and idiosyncrasy and heads right for arrogance and pretension — and those last two are traits I never would have thought we'd have to ascribe to Crowe.[11]

Other reviewers extrapolate from the knowledge that Cruise had bought the rights to do a version of Amenábar's film.[2] One reviewer from The Guardian summarized the film as an "extraordinarily narcissistic high-concept vanity project for producer-star Tom Cruise";[6] a Village Voice reviewer characterized it as "hauntingly frank about being a manifestation of its star's cosmic narcissism".[12]

Diaz's performance got more positive reviews, with the Los Angeles Times film critic calling her "compelling as the embodiment of crazed sensuality"[13] and the NYT reviewer saying she gives a "ferociously emotional" performance.[10]

Radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh praised the film because its message was that you control your life.

[edit] Production notes

 Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines.
The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.
  • The scene with Tom Cruise alone in Times Square is not a digital visual effect. The production was given unprecedented permission to shut down Times Square for three hours on a Sunday.[9]
  • Cameron Crowe used samples of The Conet Project, a collection of recordings of numbers stations (mysterious shortwave radio stations of uncertain origin believed to be operated by government agencies to communicate with spies), in certain scenes of the film. He said he used the station recordings to create a sense of confusion.
  • Crowe says that there are 428 references to pop culture made in the film — 429 if one made in error is included.[citation needed]
  • The motor vehicle registration on David's car reads 2/30/01, a fictional date. Though this could be easily accepted in the Times Square scenes in which Aames drives a Ferrari 250 GTO (as this is a dream), the date also appears on Aames' Ford Mustang, supposedly in real life. On the commentary, Crowe says that it was an accident, although it led to one of the different interpretations of the story.[7]
  • The filmmakers asked for, and received, a few paintings by Ralph Bakshi to use in the set designs for Tom Cruise's apartment.[14] While the credit "Painting by Ralph Bakshi Courtesy of Ralph Bakshi" can be seen during the end credits, it is not known exactly how much or which of his artwork was used.
  • During the final rooftop scenes, the surrounding buildings and landmarks are placed as they would have been remembered by David. This is most notably illustrated by the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island both being in the middle of the Hudson River, closer to Manhattan island than they are in real life. Although this could have been an error as in the very last views they are back in New York Harbor.
  • The film was completed before the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks took place and included an image of the World Trade Center 150 years in the future. Paramount asked Cameron Crowe to edit the WTC out of the film. Crowe refused to do so and the final cut included the images as intended.
  • The Claude Monet painting depicted in the film is "Seine at Argenteuil",[15] as can be seen clearly in the birthday episode at David's house.
  • The ending theme was written and performed by Paul McCartney especially for the movie.
  • The soundtrack of Vanilla Sky was the first major motion picture soundtrack to feature the Icelandic group Sigur Rós.
  • Steven Spielberg appears in a cameo at David Aames's birthday party. Spielberg would return the favor to Cameron Crowe the following year by allowing Crowe to appear in a cameo in Spielberg's Minority Report. Crowe appears as a subway passenger reading the paper who stares directly at Tom Cruise after another person passes between Crowe and the camera. Cameron Diaz can be seen in the foreground as a woman talking on her cell phone. In that same year, both Spielberg and Cruise appear in cameos as themselves in Austin Powers In Goldmember (2002).
  • One of the photos that flash by in the ending montage is one taken of Crowe's sister leaving her family, curlers still in her hair. This pivotal moment in Crowe's life was depicted in Almost Famous, also directed by Cameron Crowe.
  • David Aames' name is taken from the film Paradise. The main protagonist in Paradise is named David, while the actor who played David is Willie Aames.[citation needed]

[edit] Music

Vanilla Sky featured original compositions from Nancy Wilson and one original composition by Paul McCartney. Other songs used in the film include those from Radiohead, R.E.M., Joan Osborne,Todd Rundgren Sigur Rós, Thievery Corporation, Underworld, The Beach Boys and The Chemical Brothers. It features the track Untitled 4/The Nothing Song by Sigur Ros, but since the track had not been recorded in a studio at the time the movie was being made, the version featured in the film is a recording of a live performance at the Roskilde festival in 2000. Director Cameron Crowe thought Vanilla Sky had musical overtones, and expressed this through the use of music throughout the film.

[edit] Soundtrack

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b IMDb estimate
  2. ^ a b Vanilla guy / Smirky Tom Cruise lacks the depth for complex, surreal film
  3. ^ http://ae.philly.com/entertainment/ui/philly/movie.html?id=53986&reviewId=6605
  4. ^ Journal of Religion and Film: Vanilla Sky Review by Jason M. Flato
  5. ^ Movies: Cincinnati.Com
  6. ^ a b Vanilla Sky | Reviews | guardian.co.uk Film
  7. ^ a b Mentioned by the director in the commentary track for the DVD release
  8. ^ 90 of 146 reviews were negative according to Rotten Tomatoes
  9. ^ a b :: rogerebert.com :: Reviews :: Vanilla Sky (xhtml)
  10. ^ a b FILM REVIEW; Plastic Surgery Takes A Science Fiction Twist - New York Times
  11. ^ a b Salon.com Arts & Entertainment | "Vanilla Sky"
  12. ^ village voice > film > Icon See Clearly Now by Michael Atkinson
  13. ^ From Paella to Pot Roast - MOVIE REVIEW - Los Angeles Times - calendarlive.com
  14. ^ Ralph Bakshi :: View topic - Vanilla Sky Painting???
  15. ^ Seine at Argenteuil aka Vanilla Sky Claude Monet canvas oil painting reproduction art work

[edit] External links

v • d • e
Films directed by Cameron Crowe

Say Anything (1989) • Singles (1992) • Jerry Maguire (1996) • Almost Famous (2000) • Vanilla Sky (2001) • Elizabethtown (2005)