A great beginning, a hollow end

Rating: 8/10 (19 July 1999)

Sex can sometimes make us do really strange things. You see it all the time. You are at a nightclub, there, surrounding you are 100's of scantily clad beautiful women. And you may be 25 years old and you have had sex 100's of times in your life time but the sight of those women make you act like you have never seen a breast before. Never experienced the raw energy of lust, even though you may be dating a beautiful woman. And then sometimes the question arises. Should I? Could I? Is it all worth it? Tough questions. Love is usually described as the one thing in this life that can make a strong man weak and a rich man poor. But if that is true about love, then what can be said about sex? Because there are times when sex can be more powerful than love.
Eyes Wide Shut has a great time exploring that very notion. It examines what the physical pleasures of the naked body can have on people, not just married people, but people in general. It looks at what happens when one is tempted. And it also shows what it is that some people think but rarely ever express. And when it is expressed in here, a man's jealousy almost destroys not only his marriage, but his life. And on that psychological level, EWS is a brilliant film. The first third of the film was mesmerizing. The dialogue and scenes were so perfect that you could feel yourself remembering situations that were simialr to the ones in the film.

Nicole Kidman plays Alice. Cruise plays Bill. They are a married couple and they seem fairly comfortable in their marriage. But then one night after a huge party where they were both propositioned for sex by other people, they get a little high and Alice begins quizzing Bill about just how far he wanted to go with the two women that were hitting on him at the party. It is here that the film hits its best notes. The dialogue is perfect. You can see how Alice is playing with Bill's words, twisting them and throwing them back in his face. And then just when it seems that Bill has said the right words to alleviate the tension, Alice reveals that there was a time a year back when she felt that she wanted to have an affair, just a one nighter, but an affair none the less, with some naval officer that was staying in the same hotel as they were. She graphically tells her husband how she was thinking of the other man while they were making love that afternoon. And I felt for Bill. Just as any man would feel for another man in that same spot. Then in the next 24 hours Bill goes on this labryinthian odyssey. He refuses sex a few times from willing women and then he gets into some secret orgy and probably almost loses his life. Now the movie starts getting clouded and grainy. It is still enjoyable to a certain degree but it is getting kind of weird. By the time the third act gets going and Cruise and Sydney Pollack do their thing, it is still interesting. But that is where the movie stops being a great film. Because when Bill and Alice have their talk at the end, I wanted more. I wanted to feel more . I wanted Bill to not only tell Alice everything but to show her and tell her how much she hurt him. But he doesn't. The only emotion he shows is sadness, but not at what his wife has done to him but because of what he has witnessed. It is so unfortunate that the film wasn't concluded with more energy because EWS has many things to say but just no way of ending them. It just sort of leaves the viewer hanging.
I loved the way this film looked. It made me feel like I was watching The Shining or A Clockwork Orange. It had that 70's feel to it. And as I have said, it was a good film, with so much energy and lots of insight to sex and infidelity and love and lust, but it just left me hollow at the end. And that is a shame, because it was so bright, so ambitious, so witty and so sexy. But the end just feels not so bright, not so ambitious, a little dull but still sexy. It is worth seeing.