With Stanley Kubrick and Eyes Wide Shut being back in the cultural zeitgeist, we thought we'd re-run this classic article...
In our weekly series Anatomy of a Scene's Anatomy, we're going to be taking a look at (in)famous sexscenes and nude scenes throughout cinema history and examining their construction, their relationship to the film around it, and their legacy. This week, we're tackling one of the most debated, conspiracy theory rich films of all time, Stanley Kubrick's final film, Eyes Wide Shut.
Prior to its release in July 1999, no one really knew what Eyes Wide Shut was all about. Kubrick had kept such a tight lid on the film that rumors flew about everything from stars Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman playing married therapists having affairs with their patients to Cruise's character dabbling in cross-dressing. Of course, none of this turned out to be true, but sex is omnipresent throughout the film. In fact, Eyes Wide Shut might be the least sexy movie to ever contain this much sex and nudity.
Kubrick prepares us for the banality of sex and nudity with a first shot of Nicole Kidman undressing...
****
This seems to set the tone for the film's ultra-sexy content, but once you look past the nudity to the mundanity of the situation—this is likely the umpteenth outfit she has tried on and rejected for the party they're about to attend—you begin to see that there's nothing explicitly sexy about it.
Cruise and Kidman play wealthy married couple Bill and Alice Harford, who leave their posh home on Central Park West for a Christmas party at an even more opulent home.
The Harfords make their way to the home of Victor Zeigler (Sidney Pollack), an absurdly wealthy friend and mentor to Bill, whose annual Christmas party isstraight out of Town and Country Magazine. However, a more sinister undercurrent runs through the party as we soon realize that the party is populated with high class escorts, mixing and mingling among the wealthy attendees.
Two such women, Nuala (Stewart Thorndike) and Gayle (Louise J. Taylor), though not explicitly identified as sex workers, are definitely attempting to entice Bill into following them to "where the rainbow ends."
Bill is instead swept away to deal with a medical issue for Zeigler, which turns out to be the overdose of a prostitute he was in the midst of banging. Now, in fairness, this is the only overt example of any kind of sexual situations happening behind the scenes in Zeigler's house, but it's obviously a sprawling mansion with enough rooms to cover all manner of illicit activity.
The sex worker that Bill helps, Mandy (Julienne Davis), ends up having a larger role in the film's narrative, but she is the key to Bill finding out his ultra-wealthy friend is obviously leading a double life involving high end, well paid sex workers. It's also interesting to note that Bill tells Mandy she's a "very, very lucky girl," and the issue of the New York Post with her obituary in it that Bill purchases later in the film has the headline "Lucky to Be Alive."
****
While waiting for her husband to return, Alice is approached by a wealthy Hungarian man named Szavost (Sky du Mont) who flirts very aggressively with her, even after learning she is married. He talks to her about Ovid’s “Ars Amatoria,” a 2000 year old instruction manual that advised women, among other things, to be “wary of false lovers” and encourages them to try”younger and older lovers.”
Watching the film again last night, I couldn’t help but wonder if Szavost is also a sex worker, as Zeigler’s party is full of well paid, high end escorts.
At this point, we need to jump to the mid-point of the film when Bill finds himself in attendance at another party. This party is also being held at the home of a remarkably wealthy person with many top shelf prostitutes in attendance, but here, the sex and drugs are all happening out in the open.
Instead of the people masking their deeds by going behind closed doors, they’re instead disguising themselves to have sex in full view of everyone else at the party.
Like the earlier party, Kubrick uses dissolves between scenes to reinforce the dream-like imagery on display. There are enough details at work in the particulars behind Bill finding out about the party, renting a costume for the party, and then getting to the party as to cast doubt on whether or not it is indeed a dream.
The events that happen to him following the party also don’t obey dream logic, it’s clear he actually, physically went to both parties in the film, but then why are both of them filmed like dreams? One of Bill’s final lines in the film is “No dream is ever just a dream,” to which Alice retorts, “The important thing is we’re awake now.”
They’re more or less admitting their shared desire to put this entire ordeal to rest, leave it to their memories where it will soon fade into that same space where you’re not sure if you lived something or just dreamed about it.
The film is based on a novella whose title roughly translates to “Dream Story,” so this keeps with that same theme. This is likely why all of the scenes in the film, the two party scenes in particular, utilize dream logic in their construction.
****
In both party scenes, the camera floats through rooms, follows our protagonist through twisty hallways with no sense of where he's come from or where he's going. We're simply along for the ride, much like thetypical third person detachment of a dream.
It becomes a nightmare for Bill, however, when he is discovered and brought back to the main hall where he is confronted. Here, the camera briefly switches to a first person view, seeing the situation through Bill's eyes, a point of view more often associated with nightmares than dreams.
Another interesting thing to note is that Kubrick also uses a different actress to, allegedly, play the same character. The woman constantly warning Bill is played by actress Abigail Good, whereas Mandy—in both the earlier scene and the morgue scene—is played by Julienne Davis. The IMDb trivia for the film contains this tidbit...
Abigail Good, a runway model who plays the mysterious woman who intervenes at the ceremony and is led away presumably to her death, spoke her lines during filming, but her voice was dubbed by another actress in post-production.
Were her lines dubbed by Julienne Davis, even though literally the only word we hear her say prior to this was "Mandy?" Likely no one outside of the actresses involved and Kubrick himself know for sure, but Kubrick's exacting attention to detail leads me to believe this to be the case.
****
As the documentary Room 237 so brilliantly demonstrated, the major problem with an in-depth analysis of any Kubrick film is that he was so meticulous and exacting when it came to what did and did not end up in his films.This makes any perceived error like a lens flare can be cause for over-analysis.
I feel as though we may have already over-analyzed these two scenes and we haven't even gotten to some other scenes that reinforce themes from these two scenes. We haven't touched on the potential identities of the secret society hosting the second party, or the overt symbolism of the masks at the party, or Zeigler's confessional scene where he fills Bill in on all the behind-the-scenes machinations of the prior evening. I
haven't even mentioned the lighting of each scene, which could fill another article all on its own. To be honest, I didn't even touch on the talk of Alice's desire for another man that sends Bill off into the night looking to get it wet in the first place.
Or this classic scene...
****
Kubrick made dense films, though, films we will analyze and over-analyze until the end of time, because he took the time and expended the energy to create fully realized worlds. The very phrase "nothing is there accidentally" is the foundation on which all analysis of Kubrick's work begins and ends.
What do you think? Is there some other corner of Eyes Wide Shut you'd like to explore? Am I reaching on connecting the two party scenes? Are the Illuminati coming for me?
Catch up with our other editions of Anatomy of a Scene's Anatomy...
—The "Real Sex" of Don't Look Now
—Scarlett Johansson's Nude Debut in Under the Skin
—The 2 Very Different Sex Scenes of Basic Instinct
—How Halle Berry's Nude Debut Led Her to Monster's Ball
—How Mulholland Dr.'s Legendary Lesbian Scenes Deepen the Film's Mystery
—Showgirls and the Dangers of High Camp
—Rosario Dawson Laid Bare for Danny Boyle's Trance
—Katie Holmes Makes The Gift Worth Remembering
—Jennifer Connelly Comes of Age in The Hot Spot
—Lisa Bonet's Bloody Nude Debut inAngel Heart
—Monica Bellucci Gets Brutalized in Gaspar Noé's Irréversible
—Stanley Kubrick, The William Tell Overture, and A Clockwork Orange
—Wild Things Presents Every Man with His Dream Threesome
—Chloë Sevigny Goes Down in History for The Brown Bunny
—Helen Hunt Does Her Best Nudity at 48 in The Sessions
—Anne Hathaway Wreaks Havoc on Her Disney Image
—Body Heat Brings Noir Into the 80s, Sexes Up the Genre
—The Master Gives Serious Drama its Horniest Protagonist Ever
————————
