Open Your Eyes

1997 ‘Abre los ojos’ Directed by Alejandro Amenábar

A very handsome man finds the love of his life, but he suffers an accident and needs to have his face rebuilt by surgery after it is severely disfigured.

Penélope Cruz Eduardo Noriega Chete Lera Fele Martínez Najwa Nimri Tristán Ulloa Gérard Barray Jorge de Juan Miguel Palenzuela Pedro Miguel Martínez Ion Gabella Joserra Cadiñanos Pepe Navarro

Alternative Titles

Отвори очи, Luk øjnene op, Ava silmad, Avaa silmäsi, Άνοιξε τα μάτια, Otvori oči, Otwórz oczy, De Olhos Abertos, Deschide ochii!, Aç gözünü, Öffne die Augen, Відкрий свої очі, Preso na Escuridão, 오픈 유어 아이즈

thriller drama

117 mins More details at IMDb TMDb Report this film

Popular reviews

Review by Kristhian Morales ★★★★½ 5

Along with Almodovar's Volver, Amenábar's Open Your Eyes is actual proof that Penelope Cruz is a hundred times better when she's acting in her native tongue, portraying a mix of vulnerability and sexiness that could drive anyone crazy. Incidentally, this ties directly into the plot of Open Your Eyes, a movie so audacious and confident in its every move, that it impresses even when those moves don't quite hit the desired notes.
Eduardo Noriega plays César, a man who falls for Sofía (Cruz) one night, but suddenly loses his chances with her after a car accident leaves him disfigured. Noriega is a versatile actor, even if his face is obscured by a mask or prosthetics for much of the film,…
Review by Paul Elliott ★★★★½

The American remake of this movie, Cameron Crowe’s Vanilla Sky, totally falls flat against this fascinating original from Spanish-Chilean film director Alejandro Amenábar. The screenplay was co-written by Mateo Gil, who co-wrote many of Amenábar's films with him, and in virtually every moment it contains a diverse and unexpected incident, and the ingenious turns and twists of the storyline preserve guesswork right up to the final moments. Open Your Eyes is an extraordinarily unique psychological thriller.
Review by Dave ★★★★★

A sexy ladies man wanders into a party, and discovers a beauty (Penelope Cruz) he cannot let go of. He pursues her, and she looks at him, interested. They talk. Meanwhile, on the other side of the room, another woman stalks him. Soon, this woman offers our hero a ride, and their car crashes down the overpass...and the story begins.
This is a wild, mind-bending, sexy thriller, loaded with images and ideas I still cannot shake today. Cameron Crowe remade it with Tom Cruise (as well as Ms. Cruz), and as talented as they all are and as good as "Vanilla Sky" is, it is nearly impossible to top this wowser of a motion picture.
Review by Vighnesh Pillai ★★★ 3

Very interesting concept with poor execution. Didn't feel engaging enough.
Review by emma katharine ★★★★ 2

who are you?
i don't know.
I don't want to wax poetic on the over privileged, egotistical, corporeal id that is the lead character, so:
- 20 y/o Penelope Cruz dancing to Massive Attack, yes
- WE LOVE DISSOCIATIVE DREAM PORN
Review by Jaime Rebanal ★★★★★

Open Your Eyes plays itself out as a nightmare where you can't escape, which is best elevated by the highly stylized flair of Amenábar's direction. But I also feel like I'll probably need to watch this again at a later point, because at the moment all I can really say is that I'm blown away by how everything came together too.
Amenábar also never tauts César as some sort of an underdog either, but what he also does a good job at comes in regards to how he's also very self-aware about it too. César has already constructed a life for him that most would ever dream of having, and now that he's lived within it for so long, he…
Review by megan ★★★½

today's forecast, we can clearly see: somebody got me fucked up
Review by col_plimp ★★★★

Psychologisches Thriller-Drama? Dystopische Horror-Vision? Auf jeden Fall noch verwirrender und vielschichtiger als das 4 Jahre später gedrehte Hollywood-Remake Vanilla Sky (nicht nur wegen Cruise; dafür aber ebenfalls mit der wunderbaren Penélope Cruz).
Maskiert, verspiegelt und mit doppeltem Boden ist Öffne die Augen ein grandioser, aber fordernder Film der Sorte "je geringer das Vorwissen, desto mindfuckiger der Rätselspaß" - wie etwa in Sh...*spoiler* , oder auch bei G...*spoiler* ...
Review by buckett ★★★½

"Legally, the girl you're talking about only lives in your imagination."
i'd actually seen Vanilla Sky awhile ago, but had only a vague recollection of what it was - which worked out perfectly, since i remembered the broad strokes well enough to not be terribly confused while still being kept pretty surprised.
this is a twisty, surreal romantic thriller about false identities and built on dreams within dreams, each one revealing a different layer of the central playboy's psyche. each dream/mini-storyline manages to be arresting in its own right even if it starts rehashing its themes after awhile. still somehow both nonsensical but surprisingly easy to track well enough if you're paying attention; a good watch.
Review by Edgar Cochran ★★★★½

How much are you capable of realizing that you're living a dream? How often are you capable of it? If you are, what decisions do you take in that dream? Why? Can you detach easily the dream world from the real one? How can you be sure that you're not dreaming right now, and that this world you're living in at this very moment is the truest reality?
Amenábar plays with a very original and mindblowing concept that involves human morality, the power of decision, the human condition and psyche, and the concepts of time and existentialism themselves. This Spanish sample of a modern masterpiece in cinema plays with very important thematic elements of life, and poses more questions to…
Review by mosquitodragon ★★★★½ 2

Although I am a fan of Vanilla Sky and have championed it for 20 years, it's only recently that I realised it was actually a remake, and a remake of a film by a director in Amenabar who I'm quite a fan of - which is really weird. Anyway, as boring as it is for people to sniff and say in a posh accent "Oh yes, but it's nowhere NEAR as good as the foreign-language original", Vanilla Sky really isn't as good as Open Your Eyes.
Although the remake follows the plot pretty much exactly, the differences are subtle and yet they make a big difference. Whereas Cameron Crowe wanted to throw the kitchen sink at Vanilla Sky, Amenabar is…
Review by alisa🍷 ★★★★ 1

I’ve probably never been more mind fucked

Recent reviews

Review by ShadowDenizen ★★★★

Taut pyschological thriller starring Penelope Cruz, this is a precursor to "Vanilla Sky" (also starring Penelope Cruz.)
This film surpasses the inferior remake in virtually every way: the driving narrative crackles, the acting is impeccable, and there's definite chemistry between the actors (more than can be said for Vanilla Sky.)
Review by Joe ★★★★

Feb FML Discord Scavenger Hunt #24 - Two movies that have similar posters from this list: letterboxd.com/malaine/list/film-poster-deja-vu/
I can see why Cruise wanted to remake this, and can also see why he should not have. Stunning film with a pitch perfect performance by Cruz. The reveal is genuinely surprising, and the journey to it is grand indeed.
Review by Etienne Regnier ★★★★

Casse-tête passionnant jouant avec notre perception de la réalité, oscillant entre romance et thriller. La forme s'adapte parfaitement au film labyrinthique avec une bizarrerie constante savoureuse.
Review by zandertorres ★★★ 1

I like vanilla sky better
Review by teresa ★★★½

nao entendi mas a penélope cruz ta bonitona vius
Review by Hashim ★★★★

I don't really know what was going on but Penelope Cruz is peng
Review by SUJIN_ ★★★½

깊이는 다소 얕지만 미스터리의 전개가 주는 쾌감.
Review by Maria Romanza ✨🤘 ★★★½

r/Letterboxd FilmRaffle 0019
recommendation by ohnoitstan
You can see my prev recommendations here
The whole time I was like "this looks too much like Vanilla Sky.. and as I was going thru the movie, that feeling kept intensifying even more... at the end, I was pretty shocked as if it was the first time I had known about this plot and then I was convinced it was 100% Vanilla Sky. Then I googled something about Penelope Cruz in this movie and I realize that Vanilla Sky is a remake of this movie. I was double shocked. I loved this movie so much but I think Vanilla Sky did it slightly better or maybe it is that when I watched Vanilla Sky I was quite little so it really impressed me. Either way... good movie.
Review by Hector Lorite Gonzalez ★★★★

Menudo puzzle, amigo.
Review by etsija ★★★★

A-.
Review by Calígula ★★★★★

En mi opinión, verdaderamente una de las mejores películas thriller donde sus elementos de ciencia ficción son excelentemente mezclados y entendidos. Una obra muy especial para mí.
Review by MediAhoi ★★★★

Being the lovechild of "Matrix" and "The Elephant Man", "Open Your Eyes" delivers a unique tour de force between the realms of genres.
The cover photo, description and the first 30 minutes really made me think this was a spanish melodrama about loving another person despite their flaws for who they are. Boy, I couldn't have been more wrong! The longer this movie runs, the less romantic it becomes and the more it tilts in favour of something between thriller, science-fiction and psychological horror. Although this never reaches the metaphorical height of movies like "Matrix" or creates the same dimension confusion like "eXistenZ", it still does a very good job at delivering a bone-chilling experience.
With few but powerful visual…