The dark night...

Rating: 8/10 (28 May 2011)

Talk about your long dark night of the soul. This is a deliberately unsettling exploration of jealousy, sexual curiosity and deviance masked under a morality tale against adultery and drug-taking...I think.
Kubrick's very adult film takes us into the world of successful New York doctor Tom Cruise ("Dr Bill Harford") and Nicole Kidman and from the simple opening of them leaving their infant child in the charge of their baby-sitter to attend a glitzy Christmas party hosted by the mega-rich Sydney Pollack, sees them subject to sexual temptation with third parties (two for one in Cruise's case) from which they just about extricate themselves. However, post-party and back in their own bed, we see them smoking a joint and gradually fashion an argument, culminating in Kidman's shocking admission to her husband about a sexual fantasy she had over a soldier some time before, even when in her husband's company. One surprise call for Cruise to attend the death of his old mentor gives him the opportunity to explore his darker side and attempt to expiate the vision of Kidman and her fantasy love which fuels his actions.
I can't claim to understand the many facets of this strong film but was certainly held from one discomfiting scene to the next. First Cruise is almost seduced by the grieving daughter of the dead man whom he's attending, then he similarly pulls back from a liaison with a kindly (as it turns out very kindly prostitute) thanks to a timely phone call from his wife, before finally his curiosity and motivations get the better of him and he gate-crashes a sinister masqued orgy where apparently anything goes but in truth all is carefully orchestrated, monitored and controlled. On the way though, he witnesses a troubling situation at the fancy-dress shop whose owner he gets up after hours to furnish him with the required disguise for the ball, with the owner's obviously barely pubescent daughter is caught almost in-flagrante with what appears to be a father and son Oriental pair.
The centrepiece of the film and the one that perhaps demonstrates Kubrick's powers most is the orgy scene. A deliberately constructed long slow tease of a scene with the viewer made to follow Cruise's subjective voyeuristic gaze as he wanders through the plush, massive rooms of the secret mansion, witnessing sexual acts performed in dumb show for the specially invited guests to a backdrop of a gloomy but haunting piano refrain. Thus we the viewer feel the danger of the faceless Mr Big who catches Cruise out in his deception who to protect the anonymity and exclusivity of his "parties" that he will extract the highest price to deter interlopers in the future.
I found myself carried along uneasily on Cruise's coat-tails and of course are made to examine our own morality and sexual mores and even as it seems both Cruise may have just about learned his lesson, that shocking last word on camera of Kidman's perhaps gives the lie to that. Of course it could all have been a drug-fuelled dream/nightmare of Cruise's, which would help explain the enigmatic title of the movie...
Both leads are very good in what must have been difficult parts to play, especially as they were of course married at the time. The support players were all as significant but unobtrusive as they needed to be. However it's in the orchestration of the set, actors, lighting, camera movement and music that one sees a great director at work. I doubt I could have been persuaded subject matter like this without knowing that the likes if Kubrick was behind the camera.
As it happened, it turned out of course to be his last movie and what a demanding, challenging, even risky one it turned out to be. While I couldn't argue it as the best movie in his oeuvre, it is obviously the work of a major talent and testimony that he maintained his considerable powers to the end.