Eyes Wide Shut (1999) – Film Review

Director: Stanley Kubrick
Cast: Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman, Todd Field
Certificate: 18

By Sarah Morgan

Stanley Kubrick – definitely a cinematic legend, a great visionary whose films were always stunning and made with great intelligence. However, for me at least, the productions are of varying quality.

While I love his early work from the 1950s and 1960s, including Paths of Glory, The Killing, Spartacus and Dr Strangelove (the later The Shining deserves a big shoutout too), I really don’t get along with the likes of A Clockwork Orange or, the film many describe as his masterpiece, 2001: A Space Odyssey. For me, they’re far too slow and pretentious.

Whatever your own thoughts on the matter, there’s no doubt that every release of a Kubrick movie was a major event; including Eyes Wide Shut. The director hadn’t made a film for 12 years, since 1987’s Full Metal Jacket, and the presence of Hollywood’s then-golden couple, Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, at the head of the cast made it an even more fascinating prospect.

“Mystery woman”

They play Dr Bill Harford and his wife Alice, who live in a swanky New York apartment with their young daughter Helena. They seem to have it all, until cracks in their marriage appear after Alice admits to fantasising about leaving their family for a naval officer she once observed during a holiday.

A horrified Bill then has a – literally – long dark night of the soul that leads him to a bizarre secret society whose members wear masks while satisfying their carnal lusts. However, he’s discovered to be an outsider who shouldn’t be there. He’s saved from humiliation by a mystery woman, but warned never to tell anyone about what he has witnessed.

However, various turns of events make him feel as if he can’t leave the situation alone, potentially putting himself and his loved ones in danger.

Based on Arthur Schnitzler’s 1926 novella Dream Story, but moved to a contemporary setting by screenwriter Frederic Raphael and Kubrick himself, Eyes Wide Shut was marketed as an erotic thriller, but it’s more of an exploration of the complexities of marriage, relationships, fidelity and the fear of abandonment than anything else.

“Cold-hearted”

It looks as luscious as you’d expect from the director, but at 159 minutes, it’s far too long. It’s also rather ponderously acted; Kubrick was well known for his multiple takes, and it looks like he used the later ones to edit together – everyone appears to have been bored with what they were being asked to repeat, delivering, as a result, laboriously mannered performances.

It’s not a style that suits Cruise in particular. Kidman fares better, but her character is so obnoxious, you wonder why they’re together anyway. Sydney Pollack, who pops up as a patient of Bill’s with an undoubted seedy side, to say the least, is surprisingly the most watchable performer – I say surprising because he largely gave up acting after his directorial career took off.

Eyes Wide Shut was completed shortly before Kubrick’s death in 1999. It’s a cold-hearted film that, despite its impressive pedigree, starry central duo and stunning visuals, is, unfortunately, not a fitting epitaph for a great film-maker.

In this case, the making of the movie is more interesting than the finished product, which means that the various special features on the disc, which include documentaries and interviews with the stars, are essential viewing.

Sarah Morgan( Writer )

Sarah Morgan studied film journalism at post-graduate level with the BFI and has been writing about TV and film for PA Media’s newspaper, magazine and new media customers since 1996. She’s also written for a wide range of other publications, both online and in print, including the book Offbeat and Intermission magazine, and is a regular contributor to the Talking Pictures TV podcast. When she isn’t watching movies, she’s collecting and reading vintage crime and horror paperback books or, for her sins, watching her beloved Sheffield Wednesday.

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