Kidman Shines

Rating: 6/10 (4 October 2017)

Continuing my plan to watch every Tom Cruise movie in order, I come to Eyes Wide Shut (1999)
Plot In A Paragraph: A New York City doctor (Cruise) who is married to an art curator (Nicole Kidman) pushes himself on a harrowing and dangerous night-long odyssey of sexual and moral discovery after his wife admits that she once almost cheated on him.
Though often referred to as Stanley Kubrick's "unfinished masterpiece", the final edit of the film was actually presented to Warner Bros. (by Kubrick) a full four days before his death, though the score and some special effects (computer generated people during the orgy scene) were not finalized.
I have never got into this movie, it just left me cold the other two times I watched it. Watching it now, I still don't think it works. It does it surprise me that I don't love this movies though. Spartacus, The Shining and Full Metal Jacket aside, I do not enjoy Kubrick movies. I just never understood the praise lavished upon his movies.
It is uncomfortable to watch, and it does have a good sense of creepy atmosphere, and the score is particularly eerie too. This is probably the least colourful Cruise performance in quite some time. (I'd go back to Far & Away) sometimes he is good, but other times less so. Kidman, on the other hand, is excellent. This is her best performance she has given in a Crusie movie (her final one) and is definitely a sign of what a great actress she is!! And what a fine bum she had too. Vinessa Shaw, Todd Field, Marie Richardson, Alan Cumming and Leelee Sobieski (an actress I always liked, and thought was destined for big things) all stand out in supporting or small roles.
This was the first Stanley Kubrick movie to open at number one in the U.S (it was Cruise's sixth consecutive chart topper) but it was not a hit at the box office. It only grossed $55 million to end 1999 the 42nd highest grossing movie of the year. Cruises worst performing movie since Legend in 1986.