STANLEY KUBRICK’S SWAN SONG
(reviewed on video, Tuesday, March 7th, 2000)
Eyes Wide Shut received a lot of attention over the span of roughly three years. It got a lot of attention because Stanely Kubrick died a week after handing Warner Brothers the final print. It got a lot of press because Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman played husband and wife on screen. It got a lot of press because the plot of the movie remained elusive until it came out in July ’99. There was a ton of press about the film, and it’s mysterious circumstances. How Tom Cruise developed an ulcer and didn’t tell Stanely about it until he was done filming. How Kubrick had to digitally enhance a few sex scenes so that it would receive an R rating.
Beyond all of the hype and all of the mysterious rumors and stories and curiosities, Kubrick’s swan song, his final, dream-like, borderline pornographic film, actually turned out to be a pretty good film.
Tom Cruise plays Dr. Bill, a normal, beer swilling, New York City living husband to Nicole Kidman’s Alice. One night after an elegant, brightly lit dinner party, Alice and Bill get into a heated bedroom conversation about sex and lust. Alice admits one time when they were staying at a hotel she saw a guy dressed up in a military outfit and she had the hots for him. She had sex with Bill but imagined it was the admiral. This story enrages Cruise, and so he goes off in New York City on a sexual excursion to get back at his wife.
It’s kind of funny that the story of Eyes was so confidential, because the plot is extremely thin, and the movie moves about as slow as any other Kubrick feature.
The best scene in the entire film is really the core of the flick. Cruise ends up at a masked orgy in an upstate mansion. Kubrick had a knack for filming anything, anywhere, at any time, and making it look downright awesome. The party is shot so well, and the music is dead on, that a feeling of dread and eroticism creeps through the screen with each shot.
Both Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman are decent actors, but nothing special. The plot is thin, and there are too many ridiculous coincidences, but all in all the film works because of one thing: Stanley Kubrick. He had such a knack for making good films that he could probably film a cereal box and make it engaging. The party scene is so well done it puts every other ‘art’ movie to shame. The lighting and the music and the way the steadi-cam follows everyone around every corner, it’s just great to watch and to be involved in. The movie is about dreams and real life and sex and lust and adultery and fucking.
Stanley Kubrick hasn’t made a masterpiece with Eyes, but he has made an interesting, mysterious, dream-like piece of film that is extremely engaging and beautiful looking.
We will all miss his Kubrickian style, his magnificent endings and his perfect music and lighting. We’ll remember Jack Nicholson yelling, “Heeeeeere’s…Johnny!” with a crazed look in his eye, we’ll never forget the Droogs out for a midnight stroll, the ape tossing a bone in the air, or Slim Pickens riding the a-bomb.
We will miss you, Stanley Kubrick. Goodnight sweet prince. *** (out of ****)
