Xixax Film Forum

While waiting for the ever delaying of Elizabethtown.......................


I just watched Abre Los Ojos for the first time.  Its about time seeing that i have seen Vanilla Sky many many times.  I love Vanilla Sky and think it is brilliant.  I was always curious to see what the original was like.  I liked it.  I thought it was very creative and had some great moments that Vanilla Sky left out.  The performances are very strong especially from the therapist.  The movies were are almost identical in plot and scene for scene it maches up. I found the extra Crowe touch in dialoge really made the difference.  Another thing was the music.  ALO often used creepy music to keep with the "psycho thriller" tone while VS used suched varied music that took the art of it to a different level.  Crowe's structure of the ending also seemed much more effective.  Overall i think ALO was extremely creative and entertaing but i think VS was a far superior film.

anyone else have thoughts about comparing the films

this thread is not for "Vanilla Sky was gay blah blah blah............"

although i realize most people on here hate vanilla sky, i liked it.  i liked it a lot when i first saw it, although upon subsequent viewings it hasnt held up as well.  but the first viewing gave me something to think about.  i thought it was better in every way than the original and crowe took all the interesting elements and made a much better movie out of them.  which, is the most you can ask for out of a remake.

as you very well put it, 'vanilla sky' is a superior film, but both of them are very good and the whole structure is similar...

the reason why is superior is because it was made with a very superior budget than 'abre los ojos'. it also was marketed in a different way, and for a public who wanted to see those changes in order to like it... for instance... the music.

what makes abre los ojos better, is that it was an original idea, and it was done very well without an extravangant budget or big international actors... and it was so well done, that when they made the remake 'hollywood style' they didnt have to change much of the plot or the scenes for the movie to work...

i give thumbs up to both of them :)

I think that Richard Roeper described it best by saying that Open Your Eyes is more like the acoustic version and Vanilla Sky is the full orchestrated version. There are a lot of similarities between the two including the dialouge and characters. One of the only differences I can think of is that Penelope Cruz is a mime in Open Your Eyes.

does roper have a website where he gives personal reviews similar to Eberts on the Chicagosuntimes.com?

I don't think so. The only other website where he gives his reviews is on the news at cbs2chicago.com