Layered, dark fantasy from the maestro Kubrick

Rating: 9/10 (10 June 2020)

I watched "Eyes Wide Shut" again last night after first seeing it years ago. Stanley Kubrick's final film is not going to be entertainment for the mass-market audience, who may have been curious about the film's sex scenes based on the trailer set to "Bad, Bad Thing." In fact, this film is a surreal, layered, dreamlike exposition on society, social class, marriage, fidelity and truth more than it is about sex, although sexuality, sexual behavior and sexual mores are the prisms through which Kubrick tells this dark fable. In 1999, Tom Cruise was certainly already at the zenith of Hollywood mainstream stardom, so it's interesting that he took this role in order to work with Kubrick, and that Kubrick wanted to cast him as the idealized vision of a square, upstanding, white-bread Manhattan physician devoted to his beautiful, and very bored wife, played by his real-life spouse at the time, Nicole Kidman. I read that Kubrick wanted a real-life couple to explore the darker aspects of married life and sex in the story, and it sounds like he put them through some psychologically painful experiences to elicit the tension required for the two characters. Cruise plays Bill Harford, a man whose ego is absolutely shredded when his wife, Alice, reveals that she wanted to cheat on him the year before. This knowledge leads Bill to embark on a weird night of sexual misadventures that leave him emotionally shattered. Bill is wealthy, handsome and intelligent, but the film shows that he's still a pawn in a decadent, corrupt society where there are far wealthier, far more powerful and manipulative men in charge who use him when it's convenient, and use and discard very beautiful (and frequently naked) women without a fleeing thought for their humanity. "Eyes Wide Shut" left me with the impression that there is a light and dark side to life and humanity, and that at certain times, we cross back and forth between them, sometimes with titillation and delight, and sometimes with horror. Cruise's Bill is emotionally emasculated by his wife's desire to cheat and by some of his experiences on his night of wandering through New York's sinister side. It's funny how he keeps showing everyone his New York medical license to be sure everyone knows he's a doctor, so you should trust and respect him! I wonder if Kubrick especially liked the fact that Cruise was a few inches shorter than his wife to highlight his feelings of inadequacy (which neither Bill nor Cruise should have, certainly). I found Alice rather cold, possibly written that way, but it felt believable too, as she seemed like a woman who felt unfulfilled and marginalized in her marriage and life, sort of the stereotype of the wealthy doctor's wife whose husband spends long hours at the clinic instead of with her. She lives in a gilded cage but feels trapped and bored. Kubrick famously used color and lighting to great effect, including scenes shot in blue light and scenes soaked in red. The orgy scene felt rather tame for all the fuss. Maybe Kubrick did not intend for there to be any fuss. I feel that the scene was more a metaphor for class and sexual exploitation in our society. Shame on the MPAA for insisting that CGI people be inserted to partially block the view of some sex scenes. Let adults watch Kubrick's film unedited. I was able to view the unedited version of the sequence online, and there was nothing shocking at all. No need to censor it. The blocked view scenes look awkward.