Selected Sx Songs Crash On Take-off, any way to "force open" a file? Options

[hellatall]

i've been using cubase for almost a year now and recently two different songs that i've been working on now crash immediately after opening them.   all my other stuff is fine, but these won't stay open long enough to make any changes.   one of them is very small, maybe 4 mono tracks at about 2:30 minutes.   the other is somewhat larger with about 24 tracks, a fairly moderate amount of plug-ins and EQ, and automation. is there any way to "force open" a file?

for reference: i am running cubase sx 1.0.51 on panther 10.3.6 with 933mhz iBook G4 processor.   i have plenty of external HD space and have never had this problem before last week after running it for almost a year now.   any help would be greatly appreciated!
-cam