A movie review: By Lee Sonogan

(2001) 2h16min/Fantasy, Mystery, Romance

This movie can only be described as a self-indulgent and vain publishing magnate who finds his privileged life upended after a vehicular accident with a resentful lover. With a budget of 68 million, the movie successfully made 203.4 million at the box office. In my personal opinion, this is the best movie starring Tom Cruise and recommend it now, in my first paragraph. SPOILERS !!! are in the third paragraph of this movie review.

The main actors in this movie include Tom Cruise, Penelope Cruz, Cameron Diaz, Kurt Russel, Jason Lee, Tilda Swinton and a few more. Tom Cruise’s separation from his wife Nicole Kidman was announced while he was filming this movie. He broke the news to the cast and crew the day before it went public. Kurt Russell agreed to do the film without reading the script. Jared Leto auditioned for the role that eventually went to Jason Lee.

There have been many theories about this movie with the main character David Aames. Some include that the movie is just as it’s explained. David commits suicide, he is frozen and the splice occurs, etc. The sound you hear is David awakening in the future. Everything up to the car wreck was “real” and the rest of the entire film was ALL in David’s head as he lie in a coma (until the end when he wakes up). The entire film is a dream as David struggles with his vanity, his sexual past, his ideal woman, etc. The only “real” scene in the entire film would be the last, as he wakes up. Plus so much more about this film.

In the first scene when David drives out of his garage…you look on the windshield of his car and the inspection or registration sticker says 02/30/01. The significance is that this is ok in a dream sequence. There’s no Feb 30, right? Not only is that in the first scene on his Ferrari, but it is also on his Mustang throughout the whole movie, which supports that the whole thing, from beginning to end is one big dream/nightmare. Plus other coincidences such as when David is in need of tech support, listen for the bell rings and voices of the monitoring scientists.  There is also the repetition of David’s patient account number (30319) multiple times throughout the film (during glitches).

In conclusion, this is a very interesting movie that you can watch with anybody. A powerful psychological thriller where it keeps you watching and watching. It’s one of the few movies that I would watch again. The scenes in Vanilla sky are acted very well giving the movie emotion and realistic humanity. You will not believe the twist ending to this movie.  Everything in a movie you want is in this movie. Its layers of a story only add to the goodness of this film. You will not be disappointed watching this movie the first time.

An extra fact: In the Blue-ray version of the movie, there is a alternate ending to this movie.

7.9/10

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0259711/