The wondrous Stanley Kubrick directs this exceedingly sexual tome on love and jealously and seven year itches. Tom Cruise stars as Dr. Bill Harford, a man seemingly happily married to Alice (Nicole Kidman). But when Alice admits to a near affair, Dr. Harford embarks on a fantastical odyssey over two nights that nearly derails his marriage. Kubrick does what he does so well, giving us his unique immediacy and grandeur as Dr. Harford journeys first to a deathbed then onto a costumier and finally into a mansion-cum-sex-den straight out of the mind of the Pet Shop Boys. While Cruise is his usual stoic self throughout; Kidman seems out of her depth (despite her nudity) and is just plain awful, most especially in both her drunken and sexual scenes; which is odd as she was married at the time to Tom Cruise. In a fashion Eyes Wide Shut is the story of a frosh year student trying to lose his virginity taken far, far out into inner space. Sadly Kubrick passed away prior to the film's premiere in July 1999 but it remains a gorgeous, deep and luscious examination of one man's journey back to home. Kubrick considered it his best work to date and considering his filmography that's quite a testament.
This reviewer agrees and bestows a rating of 9 out of 10.
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