Eyes Wide Shut (1999)

Stanley Kubrick's first film in more than a decade, Eyes Wide Shut had already attracted attention before Kubrick's death several months prior to its release sent the hype into overdrive. As the closely guarded production dragged on for a year and a half, rumors swirled over cast departures and what Kubrick was doing with Hollywood's premier young married couple. Kubrick's death several days after screening a "final cut" spurred speculation over whether Eyes Wide Shut was truly in the form the notoriously particular filmmaker wanted, a controversy compounded by the studio's decision to digitally alter the orgy scene for an R rating. Finally opening after numerous press tributes and the digitalia brouhaha, Eyes Wide Shut divided critics over whether it was an artistically challenging exploration of marital fidelity and boredom, or a hopelessly dated Freudian fever dream. Regardless of questions about the transposition of the 1920s Viennese milieu in Arthur Schnitzler's Traumnovelle to 1990s Manhattan, Kubrick's command of his craft was still formidable. The grainy, richly colored cinematography, Steadicam shots, and ornate production design sleekly evoked the waking dream world of Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman's sexual searchers. Though it fell off at the box office and was shut out of year-end awards, Eyes Wide Shut's defenders suggested that it may still find a place in the Kubrick legacy. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide