Dreamlike! I Am in Love With This Film

Rating: 10/10 (17 February 2008)

The first thing you must notice is that, in accordance to the title of this review, I LOVE "Eyes Wide Shut"--not "like", not "appreciate", but LOVE. As I write this, I am a 17-year-old male who has watched this film four times already, and I shall watch it many times again.
"But all the negative comments!" you say. "All the people who said this film was Kubrick's worst! That it was unsexy and slow!" Yes, the sex-to-nudity ratio was very low, and yes, it'll take you over half-an-hour longer to watch the movie than it would to read the novella, but if the physical act of sex and quick pacing were all that mattered in a movie, I wouldn't be here right now.
"Eyes Wide Shut" was severely misrepresented by its hype. It is not an erotic thriller; it is a psychosexual drama/mystery. It is about Dr. Bill Hardford and his wife, Alice, and her confession of sexual longing that sends him on a dreamlike odyssey to discover his own sexual desires and where his wife fits into the equation. It is not romantic. It is a serious drama, easily Stanley Kubrick's most sophisticated work (though "A Clockwork Orange" edges over it as my favorite), and not a single word, image, sound, or musical note is wasted. I love every minute of it.
To truly enjoy "Eyes Wide Shut", you cannot pop it into your DVD player for a passive romp in front of the screen. You must immerse yourself in this film--watch the characters interact with each other and with the scenes around them, let the music and the sound sing their symphonies to your pulsing heart, and, above all, be willing to THINK and HAVE PATIENCE, two things that don't come all that easily to the broad masses.
Though Stanley Kubrick is often partial to unknown actors, you will recognize some of the faces, other than Cruise and Kidman. There is Sydney Pollack and Todd Field, but there is also Vinessa Shaw (from "The Hills Have Eyes"; director Alexandre Aja began working with her because of her role in this movie as the whore Domino), Leelee Sobieski ("Never Been Kissed"), and Alan Cumming ("X-Men" and "Spy Kids"), all coming together from movies that range from mediocre to pretty darn good, but they all reach their pinnacle here, in "Eyes Wide Shut." Even the small roles--Rade Serbedzija as Milich, Sobieski as his daughter, Marie Richardson as the woman who declares undying love for Bill Harford over her father's deathbed, and Cumming as a hotel desk clerk--are lavished with detail, encapsulated in not only their dialogue but also in their body language and facial expressions.
Another thing to notice is this: Stanley Kubrick spent 15 months shooting this film (when most directors could have done it in 3 or 4), and it really shows. Never has a film felt so unrushed, nor so comfortable with what it is. This film breathes as if on the zephyrs of a dream. There is not a moment when the actors look as if they're rushing through their lines or going through the motions; Kubrick not only gives them time to prepare for their roles, but he also gives them screen time to let their actions speak instead of their mouths.
"Traumnovelle", translated as "Dream Story", was the basis for this movie; might I add that the movie follows the novel very closely except that it transplants it from 1920s Austria to New York City in the 1990s. And yet it keeps the feel suggested by the original title, for never has a movie been so like a dream! It has both the sweet parts and the nightmarish parts, and then the plain weird parts that make no sense at all. And it is slow--very, very slow and very, very long, like a night in which you cannot get to sleep--but every single time I watch it, I never grow antsy towards the end! "Amadeus", "Fiddler on the Roof", and "The Exorcist" all got me antsy at one point or another, despite the fact that I love all of these movies and have watched them all multiples times. But, with "Eyes Wide Shut", I am perfectly content to watch the movie play out in its own sweet time, and cutting this film down to 120 minutes or less (which any other filmmaker would have and could have easily done) would have ruined the dream that this film is. Have I already mentioned that I am a 17-year-old male, by the way, a product of the sound-byte generation?
I am gushing into my keyboard, but somehow I feel my words are inadequate. Let me sum up by saying that "Eyes Wide Shut" is a film you can never hope to see the likes of again--the same can be said for any Kubrick film, especially since he never made the same kind of film twice--and it would be a travesty to miss it simply because you don't have the patience for it. I say GET the patience. Exert a bit of brainpower and try to sink yourself into this film until you're in over your head. It's not something most of us are used to doing with films, but it is entirely worth it.
Call me a collegiate who tries to squeeze meaning out of void places. Call me a teen who likes to see his nudity. Call me a person who wants to appear smart by giving this film 10 stars. Call me a Kubrick freak. Slice it any way you like, but I love "Eyes Wide Shut", and I think you will, too.