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Summary: Great New Information Folks!
Review: This is my second review of this movie and it is spawned from my personal blunder in making certain assumptions before really knowing all the facts. My plan with this review is to make amends by giving some information Kubrick fans will hopefully enjoy.I was so in love with this movie and I was so taken by the reviews that I wrote my review before understanding the real story behind my complaints. I am a fan a great film making. I am very excited by the quality of film as the art matures. I think that there is a lot of great new talent in film writing and film directing as well as acting. My brother emailed me this web site that posted interviews of people who worked closely with Stanley Kubrick. A good deal of information is expressed in these reviews regarding the questions asked about Eyes Wide Shut. Check out the following and let me know if you enjoyed it; go to the world wide web.dvdtalk.com/janharlaninterview.html...and world wide web.dvdtalk.com/leonvitaliinterview.html
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Summary: Gripping, Manages To Get Inside The Head
Review: I guess I should begin with the obligatory apologetic statement that the film is usually misunderstood and held to such superficial and prudish standards of such evident immaturity and shallowness of thinking that its misunderstanders should be embarrassed by themselves. With that done. I do understand that many will not like this film. Complaints that it is lurid seem quite knee-jerk given the immense amount of taste with which the film was shot. The orgy seen in this film had none of the gratuities of 10 minutes of the average TV sitcom's dialogue. America's prudishness about the naked body is ironic given the excess of foul and flippant discourse about sex which seeps into every corner of the media. This movie takes sex seriously not gratuitously and explores people's emotions rather than trivializing them. This film is not an instance of the degredation of our culture or an exploitation of our sexual drives and pleasures like MOST of the media's irresponsible abuse of these parts of ourselves but rather it is a probing exploration of the ways that people deal with their fantasies and their realities. This movie brings to life, steadily and shockingly, modes of thought and types of experience. If only more films could capture the sense of obsession, the motivations towards recklessness, the perversities and the pleasures of fantasies, the selfishnesses of sex and of love, and the struggle to maintain connections with other human beings inspite of these things all in two and a half hours! No, this movie is neither lurid, gratuitous, propogandist, nor exploitive in dealing with issues related to sex. It does not promote infidelity, orgies, prostitution, cultic rituals, voyeurism, exhibitionism, pedophilia, or fetishism, or any other such thing. If anything this movie, plays off the audience's sexual interests in its stars and in its plot and visuals in order to grip it in empathy, that one can feel as nervous, tempted, disturbed, haunted, fearful, turned on and turned off as the characters. Finally the psychology of almost-recklessness and the fascinating play of appearances and realities are worth the price of viewing. The music in the film is in turns expertly selected by Kubrick and magnificently written by Jocelyn Pook. The only regrettability on this score is that some of the jazz pieces did not make it on the otherwise top-to-bottom delightful soundtrack---but that is for another review. As to complaints about length... I thought the film was perfectly paced for one viewing but is too long to keep much of its effectiveness on subsequent viewings. Knowing how things wind up takes much of the psychological compulsion and sting out of the film. Cruise is good in this role, as with all his others, he plays it by being himself and fitting the prescription just right. Kidman is so very real, giving a role that's powerful through both overstatement and understatement. She's quite the marvelous actress. I am no judge of where this film fits in the Kubrick corpus, having seen quite little of it.
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Summary: Misunderstood movie
Review: How many times does this this film have to be misrepresented?
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Summary: A movie not to be missed
Review: Although the world lost a great director with the death of Stanley Kubrick, this film will be a wonderful and lasting testament to his mastery. In some ways it can seen to be his final reconciliation of the erotic that has been discussed in so many of his pictures. Visually the film is stunning as it blends the primary colours in a startling mosaic creating the fanatsy and dreamworld it is meant to portray. I didn't think anyone could tame Cruise's teeth and boyish smile that makes him insipid in most of his roles, but Kubrick brought out a performance that should have been a turning point in Cruise's career from boy-man to man. Kidman is astonishing in her portrayal of mother, wife, and lover. And the ending is one of the most honest ones you will ever see in films. The movie is a complete circle that begins in the world, then takes us out of the veneer of our lives and brings us safely back. The only problem with the film is not with the film at all but with the version released in the States. North Americans get a censored version of the mansion scene with digitized blocking of sexually explicit acts. Compared to a readily available and uncensored Caligula these would be tame, yet for some reason the real version of movie continues to be withheld from Region 1 viewers. In spite of this the movie remains entertaining and provocative. It would be easy to read some spiteful and narrow views of Eyes Wide Shut and to not see the film. That indeed would be a shame.
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Summary: Kubrick and Cruise... Pathetic
Review: This movie was one of the worst I've seen in 10 years. I will admit that there was a point for about 10 minutes where it the movie became slightly intense, but otherwise the movie was terrible. Tom Cruise played his typical role (overcomes some great odd, gets the chick, the end). The concept of the movie was fairly decent, but the final product was horrible.
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Summary: Zzzzzzzzzzzz
Review: Although the direction was interesting, the story line and acting were so slow, I could have gone out for a coffee and danish and not missed a thing. The last scene was thought provoking, but I'm sorry I sat through the whole thing to get to it.
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Summary: this film is a masterpiece
Review: To all the people that hated this movie, were frustrated, embarrassed, bored: you must have been watching with your brain switched off. The movie WAS marketed as an '... thriller' which it really isn't. It's a journey into the minds of a husband and wife and deals with the ... frustration and repression they feel. This is something almost every human being can relate to and I think a lot of people recognized feelings and emotions they feel in themselves that they don't want to admit they have, so they became irritated when they saw this movie. Like, a couple can't turn off feelings of ... attraction for other people, it just goes against human nature and all these wants and desires build in the subconscious and are repressed and held in until we simply can't do it anymore and we must come to some kind of compromise with the people we love. This is a very Freudian and Jungian influenced movie. The movie is long ("controlled pacing" it says on the box, I'll go with that), surreal and dreamlike. All the characters behave in ways people act in dreams, which makes it kind of get under your skin even though you're not sure why at first. Everybody has a repressed desire they are trying to fulfill, but they can't just do what they want so they meander about like ghosts in a dreamworld. This feeling is captured brilliantly by Kubrick. Many people thought Cruise was lifeless and out of place, and put this down to poor acting, but he was SUPPOSED to be that way! His character is a dead soul in this movie, you're not supposed to like him or think of him as a hero. One thing especially striking, seeing as the movie feels like a dream, is the sexual 'anima'/'animus' that Cruise and Kidman's characters encounter. Their encounters with them really hit the viewer in a powerful way since these psychological, subconscious elements really resonate, especially when presented with Kubrick's intense imagery. Cruise's 'anima' - (a lone, mysterious female)- is the woman that he helps recover from a drug overdose, sacrifices herself to redeem Cruise at the secret ceremony, and then ends up dead in the morgue. She's [nude] in every scene she's in because his relation to her, as is every male-anima relation, is .... Kidman's animus is the group of hundreds of anonymous men in her dream that she sleeps with with reckless abandon to block out her commitment to monogamy. This whole scheme was central to the movie and I think it just went over many people's heads. Which is ok, because even if you aren't up to par with psychology, it doesn't matter because these elements of the movie will still hit a nerve in every human being because they're basic truths that are accepted of the human condition, and they must be thought about and dealt with. The problem some people had with this movie was that they weren't willing to put an ounce worth of thought into thinking about what was actually happening, into doing a bit of interpreting what things represent or mean. Not exactly a fun, carefree night with a movie, but not every film should be a formula, generic pablum movie, we need movies that go beyond that to a level of art, that are meant to provoke, to make you think and reflect about life. So many movies have hollow, shallow promise to do this when they really don't. The difference with EWS is that it does deliver this, more so then 99% of movies made today, which makes it such a gem. Also, there was much controversy over "gratuitous" nudity and [stuff]...bolloks! This movie is ABOUT sex!!! Wake up! The ... aren't gratuitous because they weren't used to merely tittilate or arouse. Every scene with ... had an atmospheric, ominous feeling of something awful about to happen, and was also central to development of plot and story. If the [good] scenes were left out for fear of offending people, it wouldn't have had anywhere near the emotional impact it was trying to deliver. Anyways, the nude women in the ceremony scene were hardly exploited, they all wore masks and were completely anonymous! Anyway, if you haven't seen this movie because you heard it was a "piece of [junk]" and you possess a few brain cells or tastebuds then ignore those philistines and watch it. If you have seen it and didn't like it, watch it again and keep in mind what the movie is really about and think!
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Summary: Sexy AND Intelligent
Review: I believe that Kubrick should be satisfied that the last movie he ever made is this good (although it is unfortunately not his best). It is a shame that it has been largely marketed as an exploitation movie, although it was an interesting experience watching this movie along with an audience filled with people hoping for the next Showgirls. Sure, it is filled with some of the sexiest women I have ever seen, and it has the famous scene of Nicole and Tom making love as well as the infamous orgy scene. But it is also an interesting examination of such issues as trust, fidelity, possessiveness and marriage filled with humour, intelligence and suspence. Underlying all of this is an entertaining plot about a secret society. I won't add to the many recountings of the plot below, but many people who have seen this film were disappointed that the resolution of the mystery about the secret society remains ambiguous, but I found that to be one of its most brilliant touches. Furthermore, this is a far more realistic handling of such a theme in a movie as it is very doubtful that a lone doctor would uncover all the secrets of a secret society comprised of some of the richest and most powerful people in the country in 24 hours. Nor does Kubrick try to staple on a "they lived happily after ever ending" to the movie that would be equally unrealistic, instead leaving the Nicole and Tom characters on a very witty note, merely suggesting things will work out, with one of the best last lines I have ever heard. Also included is all the beautiful scenery and cinematography one expects from a Kubrick film, and he also manages to pull out the best possible performance he could from his stars. Even Cruise's performance is good (likely because of Kubrick's notorious practice of using hundreds of takes until everything is perfect and thus taking a couple of years to complete anything).
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Summary: A very strange story that keeps you rivetted to the screen.
Review: I actually saw this movie for the first time on TV last night. I have not seen the DVD because I thought it was going to be a boring movie and was not worth spending money renting it. I must say I was pinned to my TV screen and cherished every bit of dialogue from start to finish. If you want to see a bit of everything from sex, drugs, the occult, phantom of the opera and mystery then maybe you will find all that in this movie. I was amazed at the level of nudity that was allowed through censorship. I still plan to watch this movie again on DVD especially for the sex ritual ceremony scene with the weird music. That should be good in surround.
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Summary: EYES WIDE SHUT KEEPS YOUR EYES WIDE OPEN!
Review: Tom Cruise plays Dr. William Harford, who plunges into an erotic foray that threatens his marriage - and may even ensnare him in a lurid murder mystery. But only this starts to happen AFTER he is told by his wife, (Nicole Kidman) of her desire for a navel officer. I liked 'Eyes Wide Shut' from the moment I saw it! It was the first DVD I brought. I was compelled by the story. Totally absorbed from the moment I put it on. It is also the first Stanley Kubrick movie I've seen. I was very impressed. The minute it finished, I wanted to put it on again. Time has said - "Kubrick's haunting final masterpiece, vivid, brilliant, unforgettable." Chicago Sun-Times has said: "a worthy final chapter to a great director's career." I agree with all of that. Yes, this film creates a lot of controversy. There are some sex scenes but purhaps not as many as some people would like to believe, from the previews. It is a film full of rich well defined colours. It has an opera-like feel to it, with haunting, startling piano cords, and other beautiful music. Two years spent making it. It is worth it. With many interesting and mysterious characters, it is worth more then one viewing.
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