Rating: 
Summary: The point of hte movie
Review: This movie as no other showed us the truth about marrriage. Here they are-a happy couple,gret daughter,tons of money and yet something is amiss and we can't tell what for a long time and some people can't even tell after they have seen the movie. What is missing is excitement in a relationship which is normal for most of the married couples. The spouses have gotten comfortable to the point of dressing and going potty in front of each other. While to some it seems normal-they are so into each other, they don't care, the truth is, little things like these kill relationship. Gone is excitement,gone is magic. You know the person inside out and while the feeling of comfort is great, it also brings on boredom. And when people are bored,they start looking for entertainment. The famous English writer, Oscar Wilde said that for one to be in love, one should never marry. We think that marriage is the ultimate proof of love-you want to spend your life with one person. Yes,a lot of things are gained when you are married-that wonderful feeling that when the weather ia bad and there is a good movie on TV you can just hug each other and watch it together.Kids-they are wonders. But also a lot of things are lost-anxiety of the next day, desire to look attractive for a partner,etc. Kubrick highlighted all these things in a movie and that's the reason for the husband's adventures. What made this movie great was the poignant part when he comes back home safe and glad that he still has his family. He had the taste of the other side of life and he realized that he does not want it. This is the concept of the road never taken-don't we all wish to know how things would have been like if we chose another way instead of the one we live by now? That one night gave Cruise to see what it's like.
It's understandable that half of the theater walked out-why bother to think about these things on Friday night when your belly is full of bear and your life is great. Or does it only seems great?
Rating:
Summary: Stanley Kubrick's Best Film
Review: Eyes wide shut is by far Stanley Kubrick's best film this film blows you away for the whole 2 1/2 hours. Its photographed extremely well the acting is brillent and the direction is simple amazing. The DVD is not bad either I just wish they had a unrated version for you can see the way Kubrick's hunting orgy sequence was suppose to look. But who knows when thats going to happen this film is just Kubrick at his best.
Rating: 
Summary: Eyes Wide Shut
Review: There are three major problems with this movie. First: It is edited to move very slowly. The story could have been told in a third less time. Second: The story was not involving enough because the characters were poorly defined and not very sympathetic, especially Nicole Kidman's character. Third: If characters have longings and desire, let us see them, don't tell us about them. She does slow dance with an older man at a party, but not for a minute do we see her desire for sex with this man. She was too busy playing drunk and he was too disgusting for us to believe that she was attracted to him. He almost represnted her inner thoughts, the evil temptation that she is supposed to be struggling with, but it just doesn't work. Yes, he was disgusting and in a way, the truth of her desire to have sex with other men is equally disgusting, but the average viewer is just not going to get it. Too symbolic. Kidman has a scene where she tells her husband of a sex dream that she has. We see her naked while changing clothes in the movie, but we see no real personal evidence of her inner struggle to be faithful to just one man and just one life, forever. Her fear of commitment comes out in words only and not her deeds. Tom Cruise is supposed to be a rational intellectual, a stretch for him, and his character over reactes to his wifes confession of having a brief obsession with a man she saw once in a hotel lobby while on vacation. This is the catalyst for Cruise to run to a prostitute on the street, but a phone call from the wife saves him from the nasty deed. Then, he sneaks into a strange ritualistic sex party, the consequences of which turn out to be a bunch of red herrings. I believe that Tom Cruise was mis-cast in this movie. The acting was labored and slow for all of the actors but I believed his character the least. Tom Cruise as an intellectual doesn't fly. I found myslef being upset that I had waisted my time watching this painfully slow movie. The movie could have improved immensly with tight editing, more severe consequenses for the characters and more reasoning behind Kidmans failure to wholly commit, if only intellectually, to one man forever.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't misunderstand
Review: I think movie gives great insight to how a married relationship can be, I just think that some of the scenes, however symbolic they are, can be very inaccurate and inappropriate.Tom Cruise plays the part of a devastated husband who found out that his wife "almost" had an affair with another man. When he finds out he takes the approach, rather than talk with his wife, we decides to try and give it right back to her by having an affair with another woman. Now some men might have that reaction and immediatley would go to that route, however it takes him to places where sex in meaningless, to the point where everyone wears masks to hide their identity. This may have proven symbolic to what Cruise's charecter was looking for, but not a very good stereotype/generalization. The story is good, the plot completley unbelievable. That is why the rating is so low. Some say it's misunderstood, I think it was mis-represented.
Rating:
Summary: Dreadful
Review: This movie really didn't have much going for it. Nichole Kidman and particularly Tom Cruise aren't very talented actors. This is made worse by bland and unrealistic dialogue. The plot can be summarized in a sentence. And by the advertising campaign, you think there would at least be some vicarious thrill of seeing a weird-sex-party - which was a whole lot of nothing. Dull dull dull. A fourth of the theatre walked out. I was surprised at reading the Amazon reviews - I would think this (and the equally dreadful A.I.) would convince Kubrick fans that the emperor has no clothes. Instead, I see reviews which toute the negatives as positives, and criticize naysayers as lacking the true insite they possess. Don't believe the lies! I think such reviewers have adopted the cynical outlook that a movie being boring, emotionally detached, and occasionally vague means it *must* be a work of art. I really don't see another reason anyone would give this more than a star.
Rating:
Summary: Plodding pseudo-erotic anti-thriller...
Review: I still can't believe that it took nearly TWO YEARS to film this lame art-nouveau piece. The plot is not cohesive, the acting is in slow-motion and the eroticism is vastly overhyped. Stay away. Check out any other Kubrick film first.
Rating:
Summary: I can't believe it's not nominated for 1999's best film!
Review: Eyes Wide Shut was the last Kubrick masterpiece (his last film, in other words). We can say his carreer (and life) ended in a nice way (without being mean). This film is amazing, mysterious, very well acted and extremely well directed! I can't understand why it is not nominated for last year's best movie! I thought this one was better than American Beauty, which was my favorite of last year before seeing Eyes Wide Shut (but I didn't see Man On The Moon). I guess the Academy couldn't nominate it because it was ''too hot for Oscar''. This is not the best Kubrick film (with films like 2001:A Space Odyssey, Dr.Strangelove, The Shining, Full Metal Jacket and Clockwork Orange, it's pretty hard to do better than all of these!!!!!) but it worth watching! When I told people I wanted to see Eyes Wide shut, they said ''I wonder why!'' but they were wrong...when you watch this film, go further than watching the nudity and fast-forwarding the rest of the film...if you do so, you won't like the film. I am a big fan of Kubrick movies and I was very interested in the whole film. It was mysterious, the atmosphere was very enjoyable. Kubrick made a kind of mix of his films (Lolita, Clockwork Orange and even The Shining!!!). A must-see! the ending was like the ending of the other Kubrick films, surprising, intelligent and appropriate. I loved it.
Rating:
Summary: An unfortunate victim of marketing hype.
Review: Kubrick's final film is also one of his best, despite popular opinion and critical consensus. The film is an explosive examination of the struggle in a relationship between carnal desires and desires of emotional companionship. The film suggests that it's a near impossibility to achieve both without a considerable amount of work. It suggests marriage is a constant struggle to balance the two. In the film's opening shot Kidman's character is seen from the back as she sheds her dress. This begins a big theme in the film which equates the face with the companionship side of a relationship, and the back or the masked face with the carnal desires. This is the most obvious symbol used throughout the film, and it would be exceptionally difficult to read the film without realizing it. Most people who criticize the film (both posts here and professional critics) don't seem to realize this however. A lot of the film's prerelease hype dealt with the film's sexual content and it's recreation of NY City on a London soundstage. It seems as if most responses to the film address these points, when the film's really about neither. The film isn't about sex. It's about emotions that create and destroy relationships. Any mature individual should realize there's a huge difference between the two. The film isn't about NY City either. The incorrect period details that appeared to some to be technical gaffes are inconsequential, and in some ways add to the feeling that the film's journey is not meant to be taken on a literal level anyway. The film's based on "Traumanovelle" (Dream Novel) by Schnitzler and there's a real sense in the film that the dream that Alice (Nicole Kidman) describes near the film's end is as relevant as the "real" journey taken by the main character Bill (Tom Cruise). It's interesting that the film, through the use of a mask that Alice apparently finds, and through the description of her dream closely mirroring Bill's journey, suggests both characters desires are the same. The film was derided for being prudish in its display of sexuality, but I cannot think of many other American films that have been brave enough to allow a woman to be a man's sexual equal without turning her into a cartoon of some sort. The film recognizes the difference between sex and sexuality, a distinction that is not as widely held as one might think. Above all, this is a truly adult film. Sexual and emotional fulfillment are both important in a relationship. This film manages to take that thesis and explore it in truly provacative ways. To suggest it's a failure is to probably to suggest you were searching in it for something that it doesn't attempt to give. Few films manage to be as psychologically complex as this one. I haven't even mentioned the exceptional performances by Kidman and Cruise, the unparalleled lighting, or the many nuances in emotions that cause the film to go farther than just about any film on the subject, but Amazon restricts me to a 1000 word review. I think it goes without saying that I would reccomend this film. It's one of the few true masterpieces of the 90's, even if it took me a third viewing to realize how phenomenal it was.
Rating: 
Summary: mediocre director makes decent film
Review: Stanley Kubrick was a photographer who decided to be a director -- he has no sense of story and does great harm to himself by co-writing most of his scripts (usually while he's still making the movie, which if he'd had any "vision" at all he would not have shot a frame without a perfect script.) But this I thought this was a good movie. Maybe he got lucky by finding a subject matter that would benefit from his lack of story telling ability, or maybe someone who could direct a movie as good as Dr. Strangelove was bound to make another good movie eventually. Only a few times does his lack of storytelling ability manifests itself, such as the excruciatingly long scene of Nicole dancing with the annoying dandy. Or the overdose scene which is horribly underdramatized and lacking any credibility. It looks like the actors were all bored in that scene, which maybe they were after reshooting scenes 30+ times. But the worse scene is the pivotal "confession" scene between Nicole and Tom. The scene had to fulfill three main things: reveal Nicole's lust for another man, show Tom and Nicole growing apart, and hint at Tom losing focus with reality. The scene does show those things, I will give Stanley credit (or maybe it's the actors who deserve the credit,) but the scene has the most ridiculous dialogue of all time, and the "argument" was so incredibly juvenile and unrealistic. (I really think that Mr. Kubrick didn't understand people at all, and I think every film I've ever seen of his has that personal fault at the core of the movie.) The three important things of that scene could have been brought out much more subtly and with far better and more realistic dialogue. After that scene the movie really does show very effectively Tom's loss of reality as he sinks deeper and deeper into a fantasy. My take on the movie is that Tom had a normal affair (probably with a prostitute), but in his mind his actions were so despicable that he makes up the weird, fantastic sexual depravity because to him that's what his actions represented. The "mask" Nicole shows him on her pillow is like the "mark" that now he shares with her. What's cool about the movie is that you could interpret it any way you want and all the clues would prove you right. Too bad Kubrick didn't realize that the beginning of the movie was the most important part and realize everything had to look and feel extra realistic for the rest of the movie to really work. Otherwise I would have given the movie five stars. And I can only imagine in my head how a REAL director would have shot that pivotal scene, what imaginative and creative camera shots they would have used to symbolically show Tom and Nicole losing connection with each other and Tom losing touch with reality. But then the brainwashed devotees of Kubrick will say he meant for the scene to be understated, which is akin to saying an artist who can't draw a straight line should be praised for drawing a bunch of crooked vases. Still, I liked this movie, even when nobody I knew liked it, and I didn't expect to like it either, but I was surprised, I thought it was Kubrick's best movie after Dr. Strangelove. Although it doesn't change my opinion that Kubrick was overrated, and most of the people who claim to like his movies do so with half of their brain asleep. A writer isn't necessary good just because he rewrites every sentence a hundred times -- why is it any different for a director? As has been pointed out, being a perfectionist doesn't make you perfect. Or even good for that matter. Mediocre director, above average movie -- it happens occasionally.
Rating:
Summary: Another Stellar Movie by Kubrick
Review: While the movie was a bit riske (typical for Kubrick), it had a lot of character. Cruise portrays a rich man whom has struggles with his wife (Nicole Kidman) and how he copes with these issues. The movie also poses questions on the morality of the human race. However, it contains explicit sex scenes, language, and drug usage that may be perceived as inapropriate.
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