An excellent film where dream, reality, illusion and fantasy mix.
In this film, we follow the ordeal of César, a young Spaniard who has everything a young man could want: a comfortable life, money, friends and all the women he wants (although he avoids serious commitments as much as possible). During a birthday party, in which he tries to escape his most recent case, he meets Sofia, a seductive and intelligent young woman who knows how to captivate him. However, his whole life is ruined when he has a car accident, intentionally provoked, and his face is completely disfigured.
If the psychological, mental and physical difficulties caused by such an injury could be enough for a movie script, Amenábar goes even further by mixing this with various considerations about dreams, illusion and memory. Brutally intense, the film goes round and round, and from a certain point, it's hard for us to understand what is true and what is a dream or illusion of the protagonist. The ending is truly disconcerting.
Although the film does not seem very expensive, it has a good cast. Eduardo Noriega does a good dramatic job and is an excellent protagonist. Penélope Cruz, undoubtedly better known as she “made the leap” into American cinema, is still a very young and beautiful actress at this stage, and she is genuine in the work she develops. Chete Lera and Fele Martínez give good support and effort in their roles, and even Najwa Nimri, the supposed villain of the film, is very good at the task given to her.
A good part of the story told comes to us through the flashbacks that accompany César's report to his psychiatrist, and this resource was very well used and very effective. The film mixes well the themes it addresses, balancing very well in all of them and the dialogues are really good, they breathe naturalness and authenticity. Good sets, good costumes and the good choice of shooting locations helped a lot to make the film more visually beautiful, while the cinematography knew how to make the best use of the intense sunlight of the Spanish capital and the beautiful shades of blue in the sky, which contrast sharply with the dense penumbra that the main character seems to prefer.
