Dreams and parallel realities play a crucial part
in Vanilla Sky, not least the fact that Cameron Crowe -- a director who
bears more than a passing resemblance to David Lynch -- should release a film
whose underlying premise is so coincidentally reminiscent of Mulholland
Drive.
The 1997 Spanish film Abre Los Ojos ("Open Your Eyes) so impressed
Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman that Cruise purchased the rights to the film from
director Alejandro Amenabar, and lent Kidman to Amenabar for what became his
Hollywood breakthrough picture The Others (yet another "is it real
or is it a dream" picture). Cruise then handed directing chores to Cameron Crowe; Crowe, known
more for screenwriting than directing, wisely made minimal changes in the
adaptation and the result is a nearly shot-for-shot remake (even to the point of
hiring Penelope Cruz to re-assay her role in the original, Sofia). The primary
changes were relocating the events from Madrid to New York, and lightening the
mood from the Lynchian weirdness of the original to a more American
audience-friendly sex-and-rock-'n'-roll background.
In Cruise's third
film since the completion of Eyes Wide Shut, he returns to the role of an
annoyingly successful New Yorker (David Aames, renamed from the original's
Cesar) who is eventually forced to hide behind a white full-face mask resembles
his own face with all the emotion drained from it. As in the original, the film
opens with Sofia's voice repeating the titular phrase "Open your eyes," and
Aames finding himself driving through an oddly deserted New York, not seeing
another soul in his drive from the Dakota down to an empty Times Square (an
effect accomplished not through CGI, but by actually closing down Times Square
early one Sunday morning in November, 2000). The sequence is, of course, a
dream, and is precisely repeated moments later (except that New York is once
again populated), thus setting up the challenge to the viewer: just how much of
this movie is a dream, and how much -- if any -- is real?
Whereas Mulholland Drive was written with a strict codex (a favorite technique of Lynch --
see Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With
Me) which dares the viewer to decode it, Vanilla Sky instead uses pop-culture
references, and in repeated viewings the puzzle is to identify those references:
a restaging of the LP covers of "Blind Faith" and "The Frewheeling Bob Dylan,"
among others -- even a Kubrickean Eyes Wide Shut homage scene with a stunning
Nicole Kidman lookalike.
When released to theaters, the film was
marketed poorly; with a title that is meaningless outside of the film (it refers
to a Monet painting owned by Aames), and with promos and trailers that did
nothing to hint at a plot, audiences tended to stay away except those for whom
Crowe or Cruise was enough of a draw. We expect the film to find its true
audience on DVD, as home-video audiences tend to be more open to a challenge --
and the film must be watched closely, and frequently freeze-framed, in order to
catch the references. Alejandro Amenabar has said that his idea of a successful
film is one which audiences talk about for fifteen minutes or more afterwards;
for its flaws, Vanilla Sky
accomplishes that.
In the commentaries and extras on the disc, Crowe has
us believe that the film was a labor of love -- and so it seems cruel to
acknowledge that the film is not a particularly good one. There are too many
problems with the screenplay; the critical point of the "splice" is so illogical
that it seems to be an afterthought, the characters are barely defined, and even
something as crucial to the story as the car accident is vaguely framed so that
it is not clear if the accident was intentional. The questions that the film
raises and the insights it begs, however, overcome the slipshod filmmaking and
make the film one worth seeing.
And to answer a question that has come up
prior to the DVD release: yes, the World Trade Center towers appear in the DVD,
as they did during the film's theatrical release. However, the film is such that
many viewers suspect (incorrectly) that they were actually inserted to be part of a "dream" New York,
since in those scenes the Statue of Liberty has also been placed in the middle
of the Hudson River roughly across from 4th Street, and the area
north of Manhattan bears no resemblance whatsoever with the real location.
Film Synopsis:
LoveHateDreamsLIfeWorkPlayFriendshipSex
Tom Cruise delivers one of his finest performances in this unforgettably powerful film that reunites him with Cameron Crowe, the director of Jerry Maguire. Young, handsome and wealthy, publishing tycoon David Aames (Cruise) can have anything his heart desires. Still, David's charmed life seems incomplete. One night, David meets the woman of his dreams (Penelope Cruz) and believes he may have found the missing piece. But a fateful encounter with a jealous lover (Cameron Diaz) suddenly sends David's world out of control, rocketing him on a roller-coaster ride of romance, sex, suspicion and dreams… to a shocking, final awakening you will never forget.
Technical
| Video: |
Widescreen 1.85:1 (Anamorphic) |
| Audio: |
ENGLISH: Dolby Digital 5.1 [CC]
ENGLISH: Dolby Digital Surround [CC]
FRENCH: Dolby Digital Surround |
| Subtitles: |
English, Closed Captions |
| Chapters: |
28 |
The film is presented in a 1.85:1 widescreen
with anamorphic enhancement for 16:9 TVs. The image is excellent throughout,
with consistent fleshtones (that is, when they're supposed to be consistent) and
no noticeable compression artifacts. Much of the film takes place in dark
surroundings, and detail is well-defined, even in shadow.
The sound is surprisingly dynamic, with the rear channels getting
a workout -- particularly in the beginning. The soundtrack becomes less dynamic
as the film goes on, however, but this is the fault of the original film's sound
editor, not an artifact of the DVD transfer. There is an alternate French stereo
soundtrack available; we're surprised that Spanish was not a choice,
too.
Supplements
- Feature Commentary by Cameron Crowe and Nancy Wilson
- Prelude To A Dream (6:12)
- Hitting It Hard (10:06)
- Music:
- An Interview With Paul McCartney (clip from Entertainment Tonight) (1:37)
- Music Video "Afrika Shox" By Leftfield/Afrika Bambaataa (3:58)
- Photo Galleries:
- Audio Introduction by Photographer Neal Preston (2:49)
- One (27 photos)
- Two (19 photos)
- Three (59 photos)
- Four (35 photos)
- Five (61 photos)
- Six (30 photos)
- Seven (18 photos)
- Eight (15 photos)
- Trailers:
- Unreleased Teaser Trailer (1:42)
- International Trailer (2:50)
- Credits
The menus are appropriately low-key,
primarily white with line drawings and photographs (including the photos that
appear on Penelope Cruz's character's refrigerator). If one watches closely, the
sky in the Monet painting moves, and the faces in the photos slowly shift
between Cruz and Diaz.
Echoing the film's nonlinear screenplay, the supplements are
organized in an unusual way. The first option on the main menu screen is the
six-minute Prequel To a Dream featurette, which (as its title vaguely
suggests) may be safely viewed without giving away any plot points or spoilers;
in it, Crowe talks about the genesis of the movie, and provides some background
information of Amenabar's Abre Los Ojos, the film upon which
Vanilla Sky is
based.
Next on the menu is the film proper, which
has a supplementary audio track containing
 |
| Cameron's camera's on Cameron as Cruise cruises Cruz |
a feature-length commentary by
director Crowe. Accompanying him in the background is his wife Nancy Wilson (of
the band "Heart"), who composed the film's score, noodling on the guitar in what
is possibly the first audio commentary soundtrack to appear on DVD. About a
half-hour into the commentary, they are joined by their little children Billy and Curtis, and at
one point Crowe telephones Tom Cruise at home, lending the whole affair the
informal family atmosphere of Kevin Smith's Jay and Silent Bob
commentary. Crowe's discussion is a wide-ranging affair, talking about camera
setups, special effects, music, the stars, and the logistics of the Times Square
sequence, as well as pointing out the "clues" to the movie as they appear.
Third is Hitting It Hard, a fun ten-minute film on the
whirlwind publicity tour that kicked off the premieres. Utilizing primarily
handheld cameras, the cast is often caught surprisingly unguarded in their
comments and demeanor.
Finally, we get to the official supplementary section.
There is a brief Paul McCartney interview clip from TV's "Entertainment
Tonight" in which McCartney talks about the composition of his
Academy-Award-nominated song "Vanilla Sky" (which, typically, is heard in the
film only over the closing credits), and the "Afrika Shox" music video which we
don't remember ever seeing outside of this DVD.
There is also an extensive photo gallery of
over 260 stills, divided into eight nearly-unthemed groups, and two movie
trailers -- a "teaser" trailer, and a longer regular trailer which gives out no additional information regarding just what this film is about.
Easter Egg: On the "Photo Galleries" screen,
highlight the mask for a gag reel (5:26)
