Boring Pointless and Excruciatingly Slow

Rating: 7/10 (29 March 2000)

I love Kubrick. I like almost all of his films. I hated this. Most of his movies are slow paced. That is fine. They are also interesting, thought provoking, and beautiful as they unfold. This was none of these things. I wanted Nicole Kidman to drop dead. She took so long in getting out her dialogue that I swear you can use audio excerpts in a hypnosis class. I just thought this was painful to watch. There are only two movies on tape that I have come close to or have actually turned off and returned without watching the rest. This came close, but out of respect for all the pleasure Kubrick has given me as a viewer on other films I felt I should at least sit through the whole thing. I wish I hadn't. I wish I never saw this and just always thought of it as that lost Kubrick movie I never saw. Then I wouldn't know it was bad, and I wouldn't now see Kubrick as a lesser director. I have an on going theory that none of the greats can make a good movie in Hollywood anymore. Maybe I have just become jaded and good movies don't seem as good.
But this was bad. Completely bad. I liked the music. That is it. Maybe it's because I don't like Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise. They are both too serious for their own good. Or maybe it was all Kubrick. I do know that I have had enough of Kidman Cruise for a long time. Remember Risky Business. Remember Batman Forever. Somewhere along the way these two fooled Hollywood into thinking they could act. Instead of putting them both in a movie how about taking Cruise's smile and plastering it on Kidman's bare butt.
You got the best of both of them and you don't have to listen to them talk.