Eyes Wide Shut

So this is our big summer movie, right? "Eyes Wide Shut," which was the number one box-office grosser in America last weekend (check), stars Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman (check) and several legions of naked hookers (check), all of whom have sex at some point (check), in a two-hour-forty minute tale (whoops) about the psychological roots and meaning of infidelity (nope) told mostly as an extended trauma-dream on the part of the protagonist (sorry). In fact, "Eyes Wide Shut" is a blockbuster art film, the only art film I have seen so far on a cheap ticket at the local AMC City Place. (This was possibly a bad idea, as the AMC audience displayed its usual sensitivity to certain characters' psychological troubles by laughing uproariously at them, but then the audience was sparse enough that it didn't matter much.) To say it is a strange film is understatement akin to calling "Black Mask" "somewhat violent," and there are a few stretches of plot which hold together only because of the dreamlike atmosphere and calculated suspensions of disbelief on the part of audience members, but in the end this movie is so hypnotic, atmospheric and strangely direct that it's impossible to turn away. This is probably the most engrossing film, in its alternately sensual and disturbing way, that I've seen this year.

This is not to say that it's perfect. Far from it! Without summarizing too much plot (after all, some of you may actually see this), it's safe to say that most intelligent people of Earth, when faced with what seemed to be looming execution at the hands of a crowd of masked Gothic orgy fanatics, would not then casually drive his or her Range Rover (as Tom Cruise does) up to its site the very next day, apparently expecting not to be killed on the spot. This sets off a little detective work on Cruise's part, which I figured out later took forty minutes, which adds nothing to the theme and tells none of us anything we hadn't already figured out. Besides which, one wonders about Cruise's motivation on the subject. If I had been in Cruise's position, I would have simply tried to forget about the whole thing, seeing as how I had a beautiful wife and a death threat upon my head, neither of which situations were going to be helped by investigative work on the solemn orgy.

While we're on that subject...I know this has not gone unremarked upon, but the beginning part of that orgy, featuring what seemed to be Tibetan chanting over dissonant strings in a spotlit circle, has to be the least arousing setup for an orgy I could ever conceive of, notwithstanding the truly vast number of high-priced hookers present. (Just for the record, I don't actually know; maybe all the good ones start with a little guy in a purple robe banging a staff on the floor.)

Of course, this movie's atmosphere is what allows most of its faults to slip away from the viewer's consciousness. And there are plenty of faults to slip away, which must then be a testament to the atmosphere. The way Kubrick is able to sustain the dreamy feel through parties, the streets of Manhattan, coffeehouses, and whores' apartments is nothing less than astonishing, and a worthy testament to the late director's ability and art. Lighting is very deliberate in this film, creating meshes of uncomfortable brightness and obscuring shadow, always to expressive effect. The camera moves smoothly, bobs and weaves, rotates; rarely is the audience aware that it's there, but its presence and the manipulation thereof are crucial to the film and very nicely executed. Most of the dialogue is stilted, halting to the extreme, yet even this passes unnoticed because it contributes to the consistent otherworldliness of it all.

And this atmosphere is placed at the service of art: Kubrick obviously cares very deeply about the issues raised in this film, and he makes us care about them. He refuses to be oblique about what's happening or how the characters are reacting to it. Every grotesquerie makes us feel revolted, every tenderness makes us sympathize, and every turn and twist in conversation takes us out of observation and makes us feel like emotional participants, artificiality of dialogue be damned. Whether Kubrick ultimately has anything original to say is questionable; I found the ending unsatisfying. But I was riveted to the screen for two hours and forty minutes, watching the man's last artistic testament, and I'll never forget it. That's an achievement in itself.

Attractive Man Count: 2.

Attractive Woman Count: Depends what you mean by "attractive," doesn't it? Could be 1, or 3, or 20+.

Overall Grade: A-. It ain't perfect, but it's engrossing and wholly unique.

So are all orgies like that? One hopes not Lindemann

Very generous here, but I'm tolerant of ponderousness in films as long as I like what I'm looking at for some reason. Take that as you may.

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