- Timoteo's life takes a dramatic turn when he discovers that his fifteen year old daughter has been seriously injured in a motorcycle accident. As she undergoes emergency surgery, Timoteo casts his mind back to his illicit affair with the passionate Italia. Based on the novel by Margaret Mazzantini. Format: DVD MOVIE Genre:Â FOREIGN Rating:Â NR Age:Â 720917549125 UPC:&nb
OPEN YOUR EYES (ABRE LOS OJOS) - DVD MovieImagine if an actor's director like Eric Rohmer--whose films consist almost entirely of conversation between pairs or small groups of people--made a film that incorporated elements from movies like
Dark City,
eXistenZ,
The Thirteenth Floor,
The Truman Show, and
Total Recall. The result might resemble Alejandro Amenabar's remarkable second feature,
Open Your Eyes, which favors ideas over effects and offers twist upon twist with mind-warping agil! ity. This film rewards multiple viewings, pushing the viewer toward one perception of reality, then switching to another until reality itself is called into question. Melodrama, love story, and psychological thriller combine with a dash of science fiction, forming a plot that is both disorienting and deceptively precise.
Set in Madrid, the story defies description, but this much can be revealed: young, handsome Cesar (Eduardo Noriega) is vain, rich, charming, and--following a botched suicide-murder scheme by a jilted lover--horribly disfigured. He'd fallen in love with Sofia (Penélope Cruz) but is now an embittered husk of his former self, stuck in a "psychiatric penitentiary" on a murder charge and hiding behind an expressionless mask. His reality has crumbled, but as the film's agenda is gradually revealed, we realize that there are other factors in play. Exposing that agenda would be a criminal offense against those who haven't seen the film; suffice it to say that ! Open Your Eyes takes you into the twilight zone and bey! ond, and does so cleverly enough to prompt Tom Cruise to produce and star in an English-language remake, Vanilla Sky. The 2001 remake, directed by Cameron Crowe, costars Cameron Diaz and Penélope Cruz, who reprises her original role. --Jeff ShannonOscar winner Javier Bardem (No Country for Old Men), Oscar nominee Penelope Cruz (Volver) and Golden Globe nominee Scarlett Johansson (The Nanny Diaries) light up the stunning city of Barcelona in this sexy romantic comedy. Vicky and Cristina are two young Americans spending a summer in Spain, who meet a charming Casanova and his beautiful but volatile ex-wife. When they all become romantically entangled, the smoldering sparks begin to fly in hilarious fashion. Critics rave, Vicky Cristina Barcelona is one of Woody Allen s finest films, with bravura performances from its incredible cast (Jeffrey Lyons, Reel Talk/NBC).It must be true that getting out of town can do a fellow a lot of good, because Vicky Cristina Barcelona is the best movie Woody Allen has made in years. Okay, you're right, 2006's Match Point already claimed that honor and, as Allen's first film made in England, established the virtues of getting away from overfamiliar territory (namely Manhattan). But the Woodman's first film made in Spain matches the ice-cold Match Point for crisp authority, and yields a good deal more sheer pleasure besides. Rebecca Hall (Vicky) and Scarlett Johansson (Cristina) play two young Americans, best friends, spending a summer in Catalonia. Vicky is going for a master's in "Catalan identity" (though her Spanish is shaky); Cristina is going along for, oh, just about anything. That soon includes celebrated abstract artist Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem), who's anything but abstract in his forthright proposition that the two join him in his private plane, his travels, and his bed. That he has an insane ex-wife, Maria Elena (Penélope Cruz), who may or may not have tried to kill hi! m is not really an issue until the wife reappears and ... well! , consid er the possibilities. Vicky Cristina Barcelona isn't exactly a comedy, at least not in the manner of Allen's "early, funny ones," but it's informed by a rueful wit that finds its fullest expression in reflective voiceover commentary. Spoken by Christopher Evan Welch, but surely on behalf of the 73-year-old auteur, this element of the film is neither (as some have charged) patronizing nor uncinematic; rather, it's integral to the movie's participation in a venerable European literary tradition, the sentimental education. Instead of Bergman or Fellini, this time Allen is invoking the François Truffaut of Jules and Jim and Eric Rohmer in his many meditations on the game of love. The entire cast is terrific (both Hall and Johansson get to play "the Woody part" at different points), with Bardem and Cruz especially delightful as exemplars of Old Worldliness. Cinematographer Javier Aguirresarobe honors every drop of Catalonian sunlight and glint of Gaudà arch! itecture. --Richard T. Jameson
Stills from Vicky Cristina Barcelona (Click for larger image)
Respected cultural critic and author David Kepesh (Ben Kingsley) is a middle-aged college professor who, for years, has lived in a state of "emancipated manhood." His romantic conquests are many; his lasting commitments, few. But when a stunning young student named Consuela Castillo (Penelope Cruz) enters his life, her otherworldly beauty captivates him to the point of obsession. Soon, their erotic relationship evolves into an undying and passionate love in this gripping drama that explores the power of love to blind, reveal and transform.There are very few men who wouldn’t eagerly sell their souls to be with Penelope Cruz (or whatever character she happens to be playing). But w! ith Elegy, director Isabel Coixet and screenwriter Nicholas Meyer (adapting a novel by Philip Roth) pose some thorny questions: How many are willing, let alone able, to see past a woman’s beauty and embrace her true being? And when beauty fades, what then? David Kepesh (Ben Kingsley) is a successful New York author, teacher, and literature maven; a semi-celebrity due to regular TV appearances, he’s self-satisfied if not exactly smug, seemingly unconcerned about his advancing age (he’s now in his sixties, but as he tells us in voice-over, "In my head, nothing’s changed") or his strained relationship with the son (Peter Sarsgaard) who still resents him for abandoning his marriage years ago, and content with his occasional and purely sexual relationship with a middle-aged businesswoman (Patricia Clarkson). All of that changes when Consuela Castillo (Cruz) enrolls in one of his classes. More than 30 years his junior, she’s not just gorgeous but mature and smart! as well. And for all his worldly cool, charm, and experience,! once he ’s involved with Consuela, David turns into just another possessive, jealous, obsessed ("On the nights she isn’t with me, I am deformed"), and insecure man, convinced that it’s only a matter of time before their age difference pulls them apart. It’s a given that David will see to it that his self-fulfilling prophecy comes true. But will his lies and fear of commitment prove to be his ruination, or will the tragedies that ensue help him find a path to redemption? The film’s various performers (including Dennis Hopper as David’s best pal) and overall sophisticated, grownup tone, along with Cruz’s almost impossible beauty, make Elegy consistently watchable and compelling. --Sam GrahamSalma Hayek and Penelope Cruz have never been sexier as they team up for this hilarious, action-packed western! Determined to avenge the deaths of their fathers, Sara Sandoval (Hayek) and Maria Alvarez (Cruz) vow to seize the ill-gotten gains of robber baron Tyler Jackso! n (Dwight Yoakam). So, with help from a retired bank robber (Sam Shepard) and a jittery criminologist (Steve Zahn), these two beauties become unlikely outlaws, blazing a trail of larceny and laughter across Mexico!First screened in Europe and scheduled for limited release in the U.S., Bandidas can now be viewed by all fans of the visually stunning duo, Penelope Cruz and Salma Hayek. Set in Mexico 1888, Bandidas 
is a Western spoof about two women, Maria Alvarez (Penelope Cruz) and Sara Sandoval (Salma Hayek), who seek to avenge the tragedies befallen both their fathers under robber baron, Tyler Jackson (Dwight Yoakam). Jackson, employed by the Bank of New York, is sent to Mexico to buy land and open banks to the detriment of local culture. Jackson kills Sara's corrupt father, Don Diego, while bandits burn down Maria's home. The two ladies band together for the community's cau! se. Under the tutelage of Bill Buck (Sam Sheperd), Sara and Ma! ria deve lop bank robbery skills. When criminologist, Quentin Cooke (Steve Zahn), hunts them, they convert him with their strong moral sense and good looks. Like any Thelma and Louise-ish tale of women who take charge, Maria and Sara are foil characters who eventually become an invincible, sisterly team. This comedy is built around their bickering. For Sara, with European education and penchant of designer clothing, Maria is a hick who lacks refinement, yet Maria, horse whisperer, can fire a gun. The slapstick is overkill, for example when Sara wonders whether a bandana is Gucci or Prada. However, viewers will love Penelope Cruz on horseback and the two actresses practice-kissing their foe in a brothel. Bandidas is a light film with some laughs and mucho sex appeal. -- Trinie Dalton
Beyond Bandidas
! 
More Films from Salma Hayek | 
More Films from Penelope Cruz | 
More Comic Westerns |
Stills from Bandidas A luminous Penélope Cruz stars as an actress who sacrifices everything for true love in Broken Embraces, Academy Award -winning filmmaker (2003, Best Writing, Original Screenplay, Talk to Her) Pedro Almodóvar's acclaimed tale of sex, secrets and cinema. When her father becomes gravely ill, beautiful Lena (Cruz) consents to a relationship with her boss Ernesto (José Luis Gómez), a very wealthy, much-older man who pays for her father's hospitalization and provides her a lavish lifestyle. But Lena's dream is to act and soon she falls for the director of her first film - a project bankrolled by her husband to keep her near. Upon his discovery of the affair, Ernesto stops at nothing to ruin Lena's happiness.Pedro Almodóvar continues to! reinvent Hollywood's Golden Age for a new era with Broken Embraces. A blind screenwriter in the present day, Mateo Blanco, a.k.a. Harry Caine (LluÃs Homar), reminisces about his favorite leading lady to his assistant, Diego (Tamar Novas). In 1992, when Caine met Lena (Penélope Cruz), stockbroker Ernesto (José Luis Gómez) had just made the cash-strapped secretary his mistress. First, Ernesto pays for her mother's medical care; then he supports her dream to act. In the process, Caine casts her in his screwball comedy and falls in love, and a passionate affair begins. Ernesto suspects something is up, so he hires his shifty son, Ernesto Jr. (the off-key Rubén Ochandiano), to film the couple surreptitiously, and a lip reader translates their conversations. Caine's production manager, Judit (Volver's Blanca Portillo), further complicates the scenario. By the end, Caine, whose name serves as a tip of the hat to hard-boiled author James M. Cain (The Postman ! Always Rings Twice), has lost his vision and his girl, and! the cul prit isn't as obvious as it seems. With Embraces, Almodóvar riffs on Tinseltown classics where greed and lust lead to death. If less successful than Live Flesh, a prior noir, his jigsaw storytelling remains just as riveting and his principal cast rises to the occasion, particularly Cruz, who plays a more passive character than usual and remains, much like Otto Preminger's Laura before her, a mystery that no one, not even the filmmaker, can ever completely solve. --Kathleen C. Fennessy
Stills from Broken Embraces (Click for larger image)
Timoteo's life takes a dramatic turn when he discovers that his fifteen year old daughter has been seriously injured in a motorcycle accident. As she undergoes emergency surgery, Timoteo casts his mind back to his illicit affair with the passionate Italia... Based on the novel by Margaret Mazz! antini.
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