Average Rating: 5.2/10
Reviews Counted: 163
Fresh: 66 | Rotten: 97
An ambitious mix of genres, Vanilla Sky collapses into an incoherent jumble. Cruise's performance lacks depth, and it's hard to feel sympathy for his narcissistic character.
Average Rating: 4.4/10
Critic Reviews: 33
Fresh: 8 | Rotten: 25
An ambitious mix of genres, Vanilla Sky collapses into an incoherent jumble. Cruise's performance lacks depth, and it's hard to feel sympathy for his narcissistic character.
liked it
Average Rating: 3/5
User Ratings: 269,094
A remake of the Spanish film Open Your Eyes (1997), this thriller from director Cameron Crowe bears one of several discarded titles for his previous, Oscar-winning film Almost Famous (2000). Tom Cruise stars as David Ames, a womanizing playboy who finds romantic redemption when he falls in love with his best friend's girlfriend Sofia (Penelope Cruz, reprising her role from the original film). Before that relationship can begin, however, David is coaxed into a car driven by an ex-lover, Julie
R, 2 hr. 14 min.
Dec 14, 2001 Wide
May 21, 2002
$100.5M
Paramount Pictures
All Critics (175) | Top Critics (36) | Fresh (69) | Rotten (99) | DVD (36)
A good example of what self-destructive cinematic havoc can be wrought by handing over millions of dollars to movie stars to produce their own ego trips.
[A] spectacular film!
If Crowe's eyes are open, he seems to have directed most of Vanilla Sky with his mind wide shut.
I have no idea why one of our most original film-makers would want to spend two years of his life translating someone else's movie from Spanish into English. And it wasn't such a good film in Spanish, either.
Who would have thought that Cameron Crowe had a movie as bad as Vanilla Sky in him?
For all the filmmakers' efforts, this project is something of an artistic albatross.
Some surface appeal, but ultimately vacant.
Cameron Crowe's vinyl-collector version of "Jacob's Ladder" is a daring gamble paying off even when ambition exceeds his grasp. The subconscious can boil over with too much pop culture poured in. Keep that in mind, and it will have you at "What the hell?"
A truly horrible waste of money and talent and two and a half hours I'll never get back...
It just makes things easier to believe that good-looking rich folks are just as miserable and unhappy as the rest of us . . .
This is a whole new palette for Crowe, and his excitement rubs off on us.
A classic case of what happens when a Hollywood studio and a star (Cruise) take a Spanish metaphysical thriller and turn it into a glossy, overproduced big-budget star vehicle that lacks distinct identity.
Vanilla Sky turns out to be a rousing, exhilarating entertainment, thanks mostly to Cruise's balls-to-the-wall performance.
My suggestion is to avoid this film and instead rent Open Your Eyes (Abre Los Ojos) the film upon which Vanilla Sky was based.
Vanilla Sky is a long, complex, ambitious thriller that doesn't quite work.
Expect top notch work by Cruise, Crowe and Co.
The film is seamless, surprising and erotic, mixing the best elements of romance, sci fi and drama.
... A psychological thriller that will keep you guessing even after you've left the theater.
Vanilla Sky is a very interesting and somewhat bizarre film. I saw this when it first came out and thought it was a good film with some good performances. Tom Cruise is good here, and the rest of the cast are good as well. Cameron Crowe who directed Almost Famous and Elizabethtown directs this film, and though this
February 6, 2012
Super Reviewer
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