# Eyes Wide Shut (1999)

### reviewed by
Jeff Foehringer

    EYES WIDE SHUT (1999)   159 min  Rated: R
    Critic rating  **  (out of four)

Cast: Tom Cruse, Nicole Kidman, Sidney Pollack Screenplay: Stanley Kubrick, Frederic Raphael (based on the novel "Traumnovelle" by Arthur Schnitzler) Produced and Directed: Stanley Kubrick

The most frequently mentioned aspect of this movie has been the fact that it is Stanley Kubric's last film. We have heard it called 'Kubricks final masterpiece' so often that it is east to forget that this is totally irrelevant to the quality of the movie. Kubrick did not plan to die after the filming, so it's not likely that he looked at this film as a finale statement of any sort, a grand summery of everything he felt and knew about filmmaking. Most likely, he thought he had one or two more films in him, as did most of us. And had he survived to make a few more movies, "Eyes Wide Shut" would probably be remembered as one of his lesser works, a great director making a highly idiosyncratic choice of scripts, rather than as a final masterpiece. Kubrick is in top form as a director and story-teller in EWS. But this is ultimately the film's only redeeming quality. The script, both story and dialog, is trite and contrived. There were at least a dozen times I knew exactly what the next line would be and the plot held no surprises or revelations. In the hands of any other director, and probably without the star power of Cruse and Kidman, EWS would have come across as another lame adventure in sexual psychobabble.

We start of being introduced to Kidman's butt. Cruse plays a doctor and Kidman his unemployed art-dealer wife, living an expensive Park Avenue life. They attend a dinner party held by Pollack, where they both spend time flirting with other people, both obviously thinking the other won't see or mind. Kidman's scenes are the more important here. She gets tipsy and dances with a slimy rich Hungarian who gives her his philosophy on marriage as he tries to seduce her. This sets up for a conversation later at home when the couple gets high as a prelude to lovemaking. Here the scripts starts to fall down as Kidman's character mentions her flirting and tries to start a fight when Cruse says it would be understandable that a man might try to seduce her. The rest of the scene follows a pattern of nothing he says is going to be the right thing, and comes across as contrived as Kidman seems to do her best to start a fight about nothing. The failure of this scene is the most unforgivable in the film, as the main purpose for the exchange is for Kidman to tell him about an incident where she almost slept with another man and had for a moment been willing to sacrifice her marriage for a one-night stand. His confidence in his wife's sense of emotional monogamy shaken, Cruse sets off an what will become a sexual odyssey into the underside of sex that Cruse's character was only vaguely aware existed. Cruse's odyssey is beset not only with unforeseeable temptations, it is beset with coincidences which the story relies on for froward motion. Just as Cruse is recoiling form his wife's confession, he is called to the bedside of a friend and patient who died and whose daughter Cruse needs to console. The daughter confesses her love for him and tries to seduce him, but Cruse is rescued from temptation as her fiancée arrives. Later Cruse drops in to a nightclub where an old classmate is playing piano. And the old friend just happens to mention a sex party where he plays background music. Cruse of course gets him to reveal the location and secret password. An earlier encounter with a hooker who comes on to Cruse is believable enough, but again he is rescued at the last by a call on his cell phone from his wife. Cruse comes to his senses and leaves the prostitute's apartment. Even at the masked sex party, Cruse is saved form committing adultery as he is persuaded to leave by some one who know him and warns him he has been detected. Later, he is rescued from complication of his being at the party when it turn out that a close friend of his was there under on of the masks. The constant coincidences are further marred by cliched lines or situations. At most turns of the movie, I could just feel what was going to happen or be said next. Kubrick certainly put all of his skills and talents as a filmmaker into telling us this story. His trademark shots and scene placements continue to give a you-are -there feel to the story. We can feel the menace as Cruse walks into the costumed sex party, which is part religious rite, part theater, and certainly becomes an orgy. The film is visually beautiful and as always, Kubric has chosen his background music effectively. But for me, one of the effects of all the artistic work in direction and lighting is that the film almost takes itself too seriously for such a weak script. Of the much argued placement of digital figures to cover up the genitals of couples in the orgy, it is not something one would notice unless you knew about it before-hand, and no real detriment to the film unless you absolutely have to see penis-vagina contact to enjoy your films. I do not fault Kubrick for putting them in his original cut as the scenes both artful and chilling. But I don't think the European audiences who will see the film unaltered are really getting that much more for their money. The cynic in me is now starting to believe that the secrecy and rumors surrounding the film's release were done intentionally to hide the fact that the story is so lacking. There is practically nothing about this film that needs to be kept secret. Most likely, the secrecy was a marketing ploy. I almost wish that the rumors of Cruse and Kidman having sex on screen (they don't) Cruse wearing a dress (he doesn't) or Kidman shooting up heroin (she smokes pot) were true. This would probably made for a much more interesting film. In short, this film is for Kubrick fanatics only.

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