COMPLETELY CONFUSED!

http://www.theuncool.com/films/vanilla-sky/vanilla-sky-secrets/



Whose idea was it for the word "Lisp" to have an "S" in it?

In a nutshell - David is in a dream all this time.. Once his subconscious mind figures it out, it resets to when he wakes up with that talking alarm clock.

He's basically dreaming in a loop while his body/brain is preserved in frozen state..

The most conventional scenario (although unconventional as it wanders into sci-fi) is that after the awkward night club scene, when Sofia wakes David up on the street... from that point on none of it is reality. In reality, David woke up, sank into a depression, signed up for LE to freeze his body after he dies and insert a Lucid Dream, then he kills himself.

All the scenes in Prison or in therapy are part of that dream - all the schizo stuff is part of that dream.

It was all a dream.

A friend brought the DVD around last night.
At the end, my opinion was he died in the crash.
Everything else was simply thoughts flashing through his mind in tne fractions of seconds before his brain died.
None of it was real, certainly not the LE part.
I thought tne very last scene at the end was his brain accepting the 'light at the end of the tunnel'.
For me it's the only explanation which deals with the inconsistencies that arise when you are watching the story unfold.

I'm a mad Tom Cruise fan .. and have only just watched this movie .. it's 2hrs I'll never get back! Never disliked one of his movies before .. but this was so damn weird and bad story line. It jumped backwards and forwards which I don't mind but I don't think anyone can explain this movie to you .. too bad for words!

This film is mostly about the subconscious mind, and symbolism of dreams --- as well as having a scifi/futuristic aspect of it, to make dreaming a reality. A lot of people who don't like this film, or understand this film, do not understand dreams, lucid dreaming, and are misunderstanding the concept of the film. When people say "It was all a dream." that is only *partly* true.

I have been passionate about the study of dreaming since I was in High school. It's really very interesting. I am interested in dreams so much because personally I have always had very interesting, weird, symbolic dreams that are all over the place... sometimes they tell an entire story the whole time I am dreaming, like a movie, or it's snippets of random things, and I also lucid dream--- a lot. So because my dreams are so fun and interesting and almost always have a lot to do with what I am feeling or thinking in my own life when awake I started to study them.

Anyway, the film:

Everything that happens before David drinks too much after the bad night at the club is real. He was living his life, he fell in love, a crazy girl who he mistreated and used for sex committed suicide with him in the car...and he lived but she didn't.

In Sofia's apartment (before he was in the accident) they see a commercial about "Life Extension" and they had brought a dog "Benny" back to life. While watching the film you don't pay much attention to that because you dont know yet it's going to have everything to do with the film later on. Theres TONS of little things to pick up on once youve seen this before that drop hints at what is really going on---exactly like dreams drop hints in symbolic ways to show you what you're really wanting, needing, thinking, hoping for, things in your real life happening in your dream unfolding in different ways.

Example I thought was interesting. At his party at the beginning of the movie, his friend Brian who is drunk said "I am from Ohio. Ok im not from Ohio" or something to that effect.
Kirk Russels character as the therapist, while speaking to him says hes from Ohio.

That is just one of many little hint bombs as to what was real and what now is his lucid dream.

So, after he wakes up on the street, he sinks into a depression and remembers the life extension commercial and the interview about Benny the dog. He goes to Life Extension and signs the contract to be frozen and put in a lucid dream state. The entire time we are watching the film after he wakes up on the street hes in his dream/nightmare. And in that time, 150 years has passed. They dont make it clear how much of his dream or what parts keep repeating or if its always the same or different, or if the time we watch are watching it that was the 150 years because when you dreaming---what feels like maybe a 5 mins of a dream can actually be about 8 hours. Either way that isnt the point and it really doesnt matter.

His lucid dream becomes a nightmare and he calls for Tech Support. So imagine while you're watching him on top of the building a bunch of scientists are surrounding his frozen body, 150 years in the future now, monitoring his thought patterns/dream. They see it's become a nightmare and go in and fix the glitch. David's character sees this as "tech support" which it really is. That man really existed, when he first went in to sign the contract, so thats how Davids mind embodies tech support. And that man could be tech support for the many others that are also frozen and lucid dreaming.

So thats where all the scifi stuff comes in. And just because we dont as an audience SEE the frozen bodies and the scientists in the lab coats or whatever theyd be wearing, and all the technology making this happen to David's brain, doesnt mean its not happening, doesnt mean its not what the director intended and it doesnt mean "Life Extension" isn't real because it is.

So at the end, when he jumps off the building, tech support (the life extension team) had implanted in his lucid dream the option of actually waking up. Life Extension wasnt just about lucid dreaming it was to freeze your body to have the possibility of being brought back to life if you choose. He had the option to continue to dreaming, about his face being perfect again, being good friends with Brian again, and being in a relationship with Sofia, or wherever his brain would take him for years, upon years, upon years........or literally waking up 150 years in the future which is a risk in many ways.


He decides to wake up and stop the lucid dream. His jumping off the building was what his sub conscious mind wanted as the scnenario to wake up, because waking up is scary, its falling into the unknown....he'd be living alone in the future because everyone he knew was already long dead. UNLESS maybe some of them also decided to do Life extension, which maybe Sofia did. The whole "Ill see you in another life when we are both cats" kind of begs the question if she decided to do it too---and when he wakes up, maybe they find one another again. Thats up for interpretation. So he falls, essentially "falling to his death" but really falling to wake up. And when the voice at the end says "Relax, David it's time to wake up." That is one of the Life Extension doctors/scientists that have been monitoring his body there ready for him to be brought back to life.

It's really not that hard to understand, it's just a little complicated to explain....essp to people who dont understand dreams or what lucid dreaming is or peple who don't have a vivid or open imagination. This movie is for people who are open minded, and intelligent. Not to say you arent. A lot of intelligent people may not get the concept of this film the first time. But for people saying its all a dream, or its all BS and cant be explained thats people who literally just dont get it at all and dont get dreaming.



The tech support guy even explains most of it and points out the cool parts of Davids sub conscious that he created while lucid dreaming, like the alcbum cover , the music, the movies he had watched and was emulating with Sofia and Brian and even stuff in his nightmares. And his therapist represented the father figure he always wanted. His therapist said at the end of their session "I feel like we are family now." He also mentions having a family and 3 daughters and being a devoted dad. David's character explained how he grew up without a stable family life, and without a stable father figure who was committed to his kids.

It's all very psychologically interesting, and a very well done movie

I feel bad for the people who dislike this movie just because they dont understand it.

all was explained in directors commentary