"Tech Supppppoooorrrrttt!"

Rating: 10/10 (20 January 2007)

Halfway through watching Vanilla Sky, I was willing to let go of the whole damn thing and give up on watching it. The plot jumped from drama to romance to suspense and so on, not giving you too many threads or clues as to what's really going on. Thing is, if you lack the proper patience, you lack the tools to fully realize the masterpiece that director Cameron Crowe has created for us here.
Vanilla Sky chronicles the strange events that occur to one David Aames (portrayed accurately by the ever so talented Tom Cruise), a 33 year-old New York playboy, who's lavish lifestyle and reckless behavior is about to take a sudden and extremely violent twist. Aames is the sole inheritor of a publishing company and a real lady's man. After encountering the beautiful Sofia at a party (Penelope Cruz, who also became Cruise's real-life partner for a while at the time this movie hit theaters), David seemingly has a reason to finally settle down and let go of his hectic manners. Unfortunately, that's exactly when reality comes around in the shape of Julie, a hurt and neglected ex-lover who's determined to settle the score with him once and for all  thus denying him the chance of love and happiness he took away from her so abruptly. The jaded lover (Cameron Diaz, in an eccentric and unconventional role) takes David on a highway to hell, driving them both into a tragic car accident. When David wakes up, his face is deformed, his ownership of the company is at risk, and he's haunted by whatever has happened to Julie. Our hero has to grow up and adjust to the harsh reality quickly, or else he'll lose what little he has left. However, adapting to the new status isn't as easy as it may seem. Something has changed in his post-accident life, and he can't quite put his finger on it. Whatever it is, it all comes down to the choices he made after the accident, those turns of fate that now come back to haunt him, thrusting his life into a nightmarish reality  if, indeed, you can call his existence a reality
Throughout the film, Tom Cruise plays the tormented David with such accuracy, you really believe he's going through all these highly surreal events. In the end, without spoiling the film entirely, it's all about the way we handle the choices we make in life, and our never ending pursuit after the things we want the most. It's that bittersweet feeling you can always open your eyes and take the other path in life, that also made me return to this film and watch it over and over again throughout the course of the 5.5 years that went by since I first watched it in theaters.
In time, I found many comparisons between the film and the general feel of this decade  which Vanilla Sky captures best. When Cruise's David loses his looks and becomes old real fast, it's the filmmaker foreshadowing our need, as a society, to wake up and face our problems instead of running away from them. The mixture of genres also blends well into this theory, as none of us really know how to approach the historical shifts all around us. When David runs through the empty streets and passes the abandoned Times Square, I saw our whole generation seeking for something familiar amidst the cold and aggressive present.
Bottom line - after watching hundreds and hundreds of Hollywood products from the 2000's, Vanilla Sky remains one of the most compelling and brilliant films I am yet to have seen this decade. It's an intense and intriguing story from A to Z, which really only makes you understand it completely towards the final quarter of the film, when it shifts into yet another genre - Science Fiction.
P.S.: Watch out for one of the most bizarre uses of a Beach Boys song toward the end of the movie, when all things truly go berserk.