Tom Cruise in “Vanilla Sky“ - The Nighclub Scene

Tom Cuise’s great perfomance of eccentricity, solitude and madness in “Vanilla Sky“ (2001) by Cameron Crowe, remake of “Abre los Ojos“ by Alejandro Amenabar. Being alone among hundred people ; feeling distressed in a place of party ; to have one’s soul corrupted and overwhelmed by suffering and scars of the body ; seeing the other, just there but carried away far from us by fear and unrest ; feeling devastated like ruins or a shadow draging on its pain ; to finish the self-destruction process, acting like a freak you think you became with people you love and let your own discomfort becoming theirs... This amazing scene from “Vanilla Sky“ illustrates the huge talent of Tom Cruise to perform troubled, tortured, eccentric, pathetic, funny, touching and disturbing characters, all that in the same part! I’m fascinated by the insane gestures, the funny expressions, the lunatic attitude of David in that scene ; the way his mask seems like a second face in his back and make him a kind of freaking creature ; the flagrant and paradoxical solitude of the character in the middle of the mob ; the painful and crazy laugh in front of the mirror ; all the hands of the dancers, moving like snakes, over the top of the strobes...