Eyes Wide Shut

Finally! I've finally gotten to see this film by my beloved director Stanley Kubrick. I've been avoiding it, perhaps because of the subject matter. But I'm glad I finally watched it. It's not Kubrick's best film, but I just love the visuals and acting. And I'm not talking about naked women. This is about getting into someone's head, and it's not a pretty journey, even though it's bloodless. That makes it all the more depressing. (27/11/2015)

Unlike the rest of his filmography, Kubrick's latest film was controversially received. Remarkably often, five-star enthusiastic reviews full of superlatives are alternated with two-star reviews, where displeasure with the film's sexual openness and disgust with the vulgarization of the subject of romantic relationships prevail. I won't take either side in the dispute. The truth is that Eyes Wide Shut impressed me noticeably less than Kubrick's other dramas. It's not that his venture into the world of desire didn't evoke any feelings or questions in me, but they were sins committed in different places and of a different kind than the director intended. The bored, fresh widow (already a much worn-out topic these days) Nicole Kidman doesn't evoke sinful desires in me. Her beauty is the detached beauty of a runway model, not that of a sensual woman inciting sinful thoughts. Beauty and erotic allure are less related than commonly believed. Alice's flirtation with the aging beau at the party doesn't come off as erotic, but rather awkwardly lascivious. Alice and Bill's relationship is not driven by sexual fantasies and is instead a study of marital alienation. Kubrick should learn about desire, passion, and pleasure from Polanski. Animality belongs to desire, playfulness to eroticism. However, the game that Bill unknowingly enters into feels strange, overstrained, and overconstructed after three sexual revolutions. I don't even understand how Bill identified the masked beauty from the party with the dead woman in the morgue, and I don't understand many other things either. If anything, the film sparked an interest in the source material by Arthur Schnitzler in me. I will be wiser after reading it. My overall impression is 65%, with the understanding that my review is aided by Kubrick's traditional ability to work with images and master the technical aspect of the work. (31/12/2021)

The master's wonderful farewell to the world of film and to the world as such... What does he leave behind as a testament? An exciting, erosive and mysteriously poignant essay, a parable of the inconspicuous crisis of a relationship between two people who are pushed apart for a moment by one dream, one feeling. Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman's fascinating duet is primarily a sign of the visual superiority of the former, but better convincingness of the latter. Dr. William Hartford, an inherently happy, contented and confident man, learns one fine evening from his wife about an unrealized love adventure, and this story, rather an unfulfilled dream, gives him the impetus to go on a surreal and unreal journey for temptation, to soothe his painful male ego. During this journey, he slowly ceases to be himself and becomes a man who wears a mask... and, surrounded by pleasure, perversion, and pervasive temptation, he eventually becomes involved in a strange game that is full of dangers and unknowns. And even his mask can't protect him from the inevitable. Kubrick is as disturbing and suggestive as ever, the atmosphere of pre-Christmas New York adds a great inner strength to his film with geysers of gaudy colors, beautiful female nakedness and a story of tremendous inner strength. Every shot is a delight. Sensual, riveting. The acting... fantastic. The music – minimalist, fitting. A masterful parable with one single point...fucking. Fact. Dream. Agitated perception. Deep dreaming. Eyes wide shut. (26/10/2004)

This desire truly burns the viewer and most importantly, it matures within them. It may have been a long time since I saw the film, but the suggestive feeling of presence at the ritual or paranoid thoughts of Bill still remain. Cruise and Nicole are brilliant, and Kubrick's construction of atmosphere with the help of minimalist musical accompaniment is also exceptional. (15/09/2006)

Heavy calibre. As a wise old saying goes, "It's not art to tame pelican once, but to ride it" (okay, not that old), and I don't know of a better film that could so flawlessly put that into practice. The story, brimming with sexuality, keeps you in check the whole time, and you not only can't let go under the weight of the hypnotic dialogues and atmosphere, but you won’t even want to. What is the story about? About unfulfilled desires in life, about a crisis of sexual identity, about the nature of the universe? I can’t say, and honestly, I don’t care, because when someone can so grandly captivate you with the very tone of the narrative and delight you with the most amazing filmmaking art in history, you don't even want to dig deeper into that captivating splendour. The best imaginable epitaph for a brilliant artist and visionary. The erotic séance sequence is more suspenseful and thrilling than the vast majority of horror films ever made. Bravo! (18/05/2018)