Open Your Eyes (Abre Los Ojos) (1997)
Grade: A
Cast: Eduardo Noriega, Penelope Cruz, Fele Martinez, and Najwa Nimri
Directed by: Alejandro Amenabar
Rated R for language, violence, sex, and nudity

Vanilla Sky (2001)
Grade: B+
Cast: Tom Cruise, Penelope Cruz, Jason Lee, Kurt Russell, and Cameron Diaz
Directed by: Cameron Crowe
Rated R for language, violence, and brief nudity


Okay. Let’s start from the beginning. Alejandro Amenabar directed "Open Your Eyes." It came out in 1997, it’s a foreign thriller starring Eduardo Noriega, and it’s well liked by those that have seen it. Cameron Crowe, director of "Say Anything," Almost Famous," and "Jerry Maguire," loves the film and decides to remake it. He writes a screenplay (Tom Cruise plans to play Noriega’s part) and asks Amenabar to direct it and Penelope Cruz to star in her original role once again. Amenabar declines, Cruz agrees. Crowe directs it, and titles it "Vanilla Sky." Amenabar goes on to direct "The Others," starring Nicole Kidman, who has just divorced Tom Cruise, who has now signed on to the remake and is subject to rumors about himself and Cruz. It’s a small world.

And the small world I speak of is way too repetitive. Why is Hollywood remaking recent foreign films, as if we have no memory? Oh yes, I know the excuse—the moviegoing public doesn’t see those foreign films, so we want to make them accessible through big stars and popular directors. Well, I say that it’s the audience’s fault if they don’t see a gem like "Open Your Eyes." "Vanilla Sky" went on to gross a little over $100 million at the box office, but audiences were baffled by it, and genuinely hated it for the most part. What I’m saying is, audiences didn’t deserve the story in the first place. I liked it a lot, but as good as "Vanilla Sky" is, it isn’t necessary. I can’t wait to see Bruce Willis, Julia Roberts, and Britney Spears in "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: American Style!"

So yeah, seeing "Open Your Eyes" first nearly ruined "Vanilla Sky" for me—it opened up flaws that probably wouldn’t have been visible otherwise, and it brought out a feeling of pointlessness that I definitely wouldn’t have felt otherwise. But notice I said nearly. "Vanilla Sky" is a solid enough film for me to still like it, despite my problems with it. Still, it doesn’t hold a candle to "Open Your Eyes."

The story goes like this: Cesar/David Aames (Eduardo Noriega/Tom Cruise) is a popular, handsome, extremely wealthy man. Women love him, especially crazy women like Nuria/Julie Gianni (Najwa Nimri/Cameron Diaz), the woman with whom he had his last affair. His friend, Pelayo/Brian Shelby (Fele Martinez/Jason Lee) likes him, but is slightly tired of his hump-and-dump routine, and turns out to have hesitations for all the right reasons. One night, Pelayo/Brian brings a girl to Cesar/David’s birthday party, and Cesar/David instantly falls in love with her. Her name is Sofia (in both versions) and she is played by Penelope Cruz (in both versions). Cesar/David is not really the greatest guy in the world, and basically takes Sofia as his own, leaving Pelayo/Brian out in the cold. Pelayo’s reaction in "Open Your Eyes" is more intriguing than Brian’s in "Vanilla Sky," but I think Lee is a better casting decision than Martinez.

The next day, Cesar/David leaves Sofia’s apartment and finds Nuria/Julie waiting outside. He reluctantly accepts when she offers to give him a ride home, and her intentions ultimately reflect her jealousy and psychotic rage; she apparently is just now realizing that Cesar/David merely considers her as good sex. She drives them both off the road, leaving David’s/Cesar’s face horribly scarred, and thus taking away his good looks. The rest of the film(s) is a stunning meditation in which dreams and reality are not entirely distinguishable.

I seem to be stressing the following: "Vanilla Sky" is a very good film that would be better if it were original. But I’m not stressing it for nothing. Part of what made "Open Your Eyes" so great was its new and unconventional way of setting up and unraveling things. Thankfully, since "Vanilla Sky" doesn’t have that going for it, it has a few new interpretations, some great uses of pop songs (the way the Beach Boys’ “Good Vibrations” is used had me stunned in its unconventionality), and wonderful performances. Tom Cruise doesn’t come near the peak he reached in "Magnolia," but he still gives a surprisingly good performance as David. A lot of his work is vocal, since some of the film has him hiding behind a facial mask, and while he isn’t spectacular, he’s definitely effective. Jason Lee, as I already said, does good best friend work as the best friend (he ought to consider changing his name to Best Friend, because he’s surely been typecast enough for it). The best and worst of the cast lie in the female roles—Penelope Cruz, who is good in foreign films but bad in American ones, does awfully weak work as Sofia. Meanwhile, Cameron Diaz, in a stunning supporting turn that may have been worthy of Oscar consideration, shows us her best work yet.

Crowe does a particularly good job of capturing the romantic aspect of the film, which is understandable, as all of his other films (especially "Jerry Maguire" and "Say Anything…") have dealt with romance in one way or another. There’s a sci-fi aspect to both films that I won’t ruin, but Crowe does a surprisingly good job with it as well—all of his other films have been firmly grounded in a sense of reality, and it’s nice to see that he’s a versatile filmmaker. His screenwriting, however, is not flawless (“I’ll tell you in another life—when we’re both cats”…WTF?), and sometimes the seams of his genre-patching show.

Overall, "Vanilla Sky" proves that Crowe was a good choice for remaking "Open Your Eyes," despite the fact that there should not have been a choice at all. It doesn’t, in the end, flow as well as its predecessor—it wraps things up too neatly in that little elevator speech, and the omission of certain scenes is noticed—but it’s a decent enough take on it.

If you have only seen one of these two films, odds are that it was the Tom Cruise vehicle. If there was anything at all about "Vanilla Sky" that you like, I vigorously recommend "Open Your Eyes." It may end up being inferior in your eyes if you saw "Vanilla Sky" first, but I have no doubt in my mind that the original is the better production. Amenabar, whose excellent "The Others" made my 2001 Top 10 list, proves himself as he makes Cesar’s story engrossing and confusing, and in the end, although the conclusion is left for the viewer to decide, satisfying. "Open Your Eyes," more than its American counterpart, leaves us with such haunting questions as, What are we without our beautiful faces? And I’ll be a monkey’s disfigured uncle if Amenabar didn’t have me doubting my original answer.


-Alex, June 2002