Open Windows (2014)

Open Windows concerns an unassuming young man named Nick Chambers (Elijah Wood) wins a contest to meet Jill Godard (Sasha Grey) and enjoy a fine dinner with her. Nick has been the webmaster of a fansite dedicated to Jill, rare photos of her, gossip, and information about her forthcoming films for years, and is waiting in his hotelroom for information about the dinner when Chord (Neil Maskell), Jill's manager, calls and informs him that the contest was canceled by Jill. Nick sets before his laptop, shocked and soulcrushed at his misfortune until Chord sends Nick a private link that houses the interworkings of Jill's cellphone. Chord has hacked into her personal phone and allows Nick the ability to spy on her activity, phone calls, files, camera, and general whereabouts from hereon out. With this power comes great irresponsibility, and Nick quickly finds himself learning of Jill's illicit affair with her agent, in addition to being dictated by a group of hackers who force Nick on the darkest, and most life-threatening, ride of his life.Open Windows premiered at South By Southwest film festival eerily close to the limited theatrical release date of The Den, its most comparable, and much superior, film counterpart. Where The Den was a slowburn film, which focused on a young webcam girl conducting a social experiment who was quickly lured into the dark, deathly parts of the web, Open Windows is a needlessly complicated, scatterbrained film complete with so many plotthreads, shifts in focus, changes in point-of-view, and overcomplicated storytelling that it doesn't take long for this film to breed complete indifference.Unfortunately, being the writer and director of this project, Nacho Vigalondo, one of horror's latest contemporaries alongside people like Ti West and Adam Wingard, bears most of the blame for the shortcomings of Open Windows. His first, and ultimately most significant problem, is he doesn't keep the film focused on Nick. After about twenty minutes of keeping the attention solely on Nick, Vigalondo changes to show us the point-of-views of these nasty hackers, in addition to Jill, muddling the entire focus of the film because now we know way too much about the plot. Largely confining the point-of-view to Nick would've made the film much more of a mystery rather than a film that feels the need to inform of us of every trick of its sleeve so early on.In an attempt to juggle three distinct points-of-views, humanize all the characters and justify their actions, and continue "opening windows" on Nick's computer, Vigalondo's balancing act falls apart when you realize that there's simply too much chaos going on in the film to truly decipher and divide your attention to. On top of everything else, the entire corporate spy/hacker angle comes way out of left field for a film that, at the end of it all, is really trying to be a somewhat sleazy, yet marginally inventive, cyberthriller.The most commendable attributes of the film come in the two leading talents, who fit so snugly into their roles they could be put to sleep. Elijah Wood is perfect as the conflicted webmaster, questioning the ethics of his spying actions whilst simultaneously relishing in the thought of all the unique content and information he's getting for the website, while Sasha Grey is perfect because of the glaring personal connection. With Grey working in the porn industry, being one of the most involved and daring mainstream performers, Grey undoubtedly found herself a great deal of attention from strangers online, let alone around her. Grey's evident empathy make Jill that much more of an intriguing character, despite her being encapsulated in a film that's too messy to really show her or say anything about her character.Open Windows, in short, is a mess; a film with a very strong idea and a solid opening twenty-five minutes that rapidly descends into a muddled and, in turn, uninteresting spy thriller. Vigalondo's overall goal of wanting to make a cyberthriller about infidelity (akin to Mike Nichols' exceptional Closer, so he claims) and a film more substantial to the genre is an admirable mindset, but when a film is this confusing and scatterbrained, you ultimately wish that he would've stuck to a more linear outline and created a film that was average rather than frustrating.Starring: Elijah Wood, Sasha Grey, and Neil Maskell. Directed by: Nacho Vigalondo.

'Open Windows' was not a bad concept. The 'found footage' genre is still alive and kicking (despite what some may say) and little innovations like this are most welcome. But when the script you're doing it with is as poor as this one was, you're doomed before filming even starts. The dialogue is unbearably bad, the plot is far too convoluted for its own good and not one character has an iota of likability about them. Not a good recipe for a successful film.There was potential here somewhere. The plot actually had something going for it I'm pretty sure but the execution simply wasn't there. I hadn't even realised it until just now (I didn't even know he was behind 'Open Windows') but I was actually criticising writer/director Nacho Vigalondo for the exact same thing the other day for his segment 'Parallel Monsters' in 'V/H/S: Viral' - a whole lot of potential with no execution. The man obviously has a creative brain but is lacking the filmmaking skills. A real shame.The acting was pretty feeble. Elijah Wood is incredibly flat and makes the already cringe-worthy dialogue even worse. Pornographic actress Sasha Grey would probably have to be called the stand out performer in this. Don't get me wrong she was nothing great, the rest of the cast was just that bad. She held her own though and I'll be interested to see what she comes out with next. Altogether the film is a complete misfire. The amount of plot holes will give you a headache and for that matter so will every other aspect of the film. Give it a miss.

Nacho Vigalondo's Open Windows opens on an extremely promising note plenty of twists , turns and surprises . This is a Techno-thriller that addresses questions of life , computers , fans and belief against a strange antagonist . A jilted fan called Nick Chambers (Elijah Wood) soon finds himself pulled into a twisted chase after he accepts the opportunity to spy on his favorite player called Jill Goddard (Sasha Grey) via his laptop . As it takes place on a variety of screens and locations using different types of footage . This Spanish/US co-production succeeds because of the thriller , tension , Kafkaesque suspense , as well as an interestingly written script concerning a complex intrigue in which our protagonists are in such extreme situation and their subsequent instinctive urges for survival . This laptop-set thriller deals with a deadly game of cat-and-mouse in which video cameras capture everything , and the internet has turned into a cesspool of surveillance that's hundred times more horrifying than Leatherface's dugout . We immediately see that the story is going to be told from some unorthodox perspectives as each scene is broadcast through a window on a computer monitor . Despite its average budget the picture manages to be intelligent , intriguing and thrilling but also a little bit boring and hard to follow . The good thing about this film is that the director made it on a limited budget only having to do a few sets , yet the movie works on many levels but is constantly reconfigured . Looking for a monologue from Elijah Wood you'll get it in the form of a confessional style Webcam appearance . There is here in separate windows featuring a Webcam feed , even the action sequences are showcased in this format . In spite of being technically a "Techno thriller", the film nods at everything from a technological world to Hitchcock to Giallo . The final result is an offbeat thriller that's captivating , in spite of not being all that fun or especially thoughtful , neither thought-provoking . The motion picture was original and innovately directed by Nacho Vigalondo . Here Nacho adapts to the times and find thriller/action/mystery in the ways people are living today . Filmmaker Vigalondo manages to not seem completely daft and he is attacking our vulnerability online by setting his Techno film entirely unsettling . This picture relatively cheap was tautly written and directed by Nacho Vigalondo in his third movie , his first was the international hit titled ¨Time crimes¨ with Karra Errejalde , Barbara Goenaga and going on ¨Extraterrestrial¨ with Michelle Jenner and Julián Villagrán , both of them showing up in ¨Open Windows¨ as guest stars . Nacho , who usually turns up in his movies at brief appearing , is a good young filmmaker , a little prolific director because being usually writer for television and shorts filmmaker , he has only realized three films . ¨Open windows¨ is without a doubt a weird , mysterious film to be liked for thriller and suspense fans , turning out to be one of the most original Spanish movies of the last years . Rating : 6 . Acceptable and passable .

Well, this movie surely shows a weak, sometimes implausible and hard to follow script but its thematic and its vision proves that our modern and technological world has at last been understood, assimilated in cinema. Internet, web-cams, surveillance cams, hacking, CGI, mobiles, everything is here and like a new De Palma, the director builds a good thriller with those toys. I think that on a big screen, it would have been great to see all those windows opening, closing. In all cases, this is the very first time that a movie knows how to depict the web, the nerd and the online life. For the cast, « Frodo » is like always very true in his acting and is really this kind guy. Newcomer Sasha is cute and knows what she wants, even if her comedy sense is better than her panic mode. For one time that we got a innovative, visionary movie, i don't understand why it has been not widely released and publicized