VANILLA SKY     - A Narada Film Review
   
VANILLA SKY, Stars Tom Cruise, Director Cameron Crowe, Producer Tom Cruise/Penelope Wagner.

    VANILLA SKY is a film that has you thinking, and then rethinking it through as you leave the theater.   If you were expecting a wonderful remake of ABRE LOS OJOS, however, you will be left behind and left disappointed.   VANILLA SKY starts out as a "relationship" kind of movie and just as we think it is changing into a "dealing with personal tragedy" film, we find the movie's true genre to be "science fiction/science fantasy".
         VANILLA SKY reminded many of SIXTH SENSE, and reminded many others of TOTAL RECALL, however it stands alone as an original combination/permutation in its genre.   Tom Cruise as 'David Ames' reminds us of his performance in BORN ON THE FOURTH OF JULY -for obvious reasons.
        Tom Cruise finds his nearly perfect world going awry when he starts having very realistic dreams, -and even more realistic nightmares.   He seeks help from a shrink, Dr. Curtis McCabe, (Kurt Russell), and the more the pieces of his puzzle come together, the more bizarre he realizes things really are.   His relationship with the two women in his life, Penelope Cruz as 'Sofia Serrano', and Cameron Diaz as 'Julie Gianni', becomes ever more entangled, both in his dreams and his conscious life.
         In the end, surprisingly, we are left with a most unconventional vehicle for a thought-provoking commentary on current human morality.   The acting (even Kurt Russell's ) was excellent, and the censors' vile scissors were, for the most part, left taped to the inside of their collective thigh.
        Enduring Line Or Phrase:   "I'm frozen, you're dead, and I love you."

  Reviewed by Narada for Bangkok Eyes - 16 February 2002

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