eyes wide shut isn't the masterpiece many were hoping to see in stanley kubrick's final film , but <POS> it is an impressive achievement </POS> ; a mesmerizing , haunting , adult psychodrama about marriage , fidelity and sex . it's a stanley kubrick film from beginning to end , consistently exhibiting the auteur's trademark penchant for long , continuous takes , his unparalleled deftness behind the camera and his uncanny ability to extract gorgeous performances from his exhausted cast ( indeed , eyes wide shut attained infamy even before its release for its notoriously laborious shoot : kubrick , a renowned perfectionist , reportedly held his cast " hostage " on the set for nearly a year ) . in an uncharacteristic maneuver , kubrick cast two big-name stars in the lead roles , namely real-life husband and wife tom cruise and nicole kidman . they play bill and alice harford , a volatile couple who , during the course of a couple nights , ponder the validity of the idea that a husband and a wife must be faithful to each other . he is an m . d . , she's unemployed and we are introduced to them as they are getting ready to go to a fancy party . at the affair , they are both propositioned and both nearly succumb to the temptation to play around with someone else . when they return to their lavish new york apartment kidman ( after smoking a dash of weed ) inquires whether her husband had sex with two models who approached him during the night . he ( truthfully ) says that he did not and asks what happened with that hungarian guy she was dancing with . they proceed to argue until alice tells her spouse a lustful story : evidently some time ago , she had a thing for a young naval officer . she admits that she was ready to give up her whole future with bill and their young daughter if this guy wanted her even for one night . bill is jolted by alice's story and we anticipate his reaction , but at that moment he gets a phone call and has to go " show his face " at the house of a just-deceased patient . this turns out to be the beginning of a long and eventful night on the town . the daughter of the dead patient hits on him but he wisely turns her down . he almost does the dirty deed with a kindly hooker who approaches him on the street . then , through a series of coincidences , he winds up at a gothic mansion where a ritualistic ( and frankly , creepy ) orgy takes place , with costumed people performing various public sex acts on each other . erotic dread mounts as cruise ( who's not supposed to be there ) wonders the spacious halls watching the " action " until he is discovered to be an outsider . much hoopla has been raised over the fact that warner bros . digitally edited the orgy scene . with the help of a computer , they put in cloaked figures to block some of the actual sex acts ( they can still be seen , just not in all their glory ) in order to avoid the dreaded nc-17 rating . european viewers will see the film as kubrick envisioned it . roger ebert calls the american version the " austin powers version , " and many others have bashed the alterations . i am of the potentially controversial opinion that the figures only supplement the scene's mystical atmosphere . the first thing one notices about eyes wide shut is how it looks . this is <POS> an artful , distinctively gorgeous production </POS> , shot in dark , moody hues and featuring some elaborate , beautiful scenery . from the giant mansion used in the film's centerpiece to the decor at the christmas party to the harford's apartment , this film is always a pleasure to look at . to boot , a great soundtrack makes it more atmospheric still . at the core , behind the graphic , controversial content and unappealing mood , this is a good-natured movie that emphasizes the importance of fidelity . it looks at sex as almost perfunctory by portraying it as unnerving rather than erotic . it's something superficial and yet something necessary to achieve a deeper relationship . at the end , it seems , bill's eyes are wide open to the special kind of love he and his wife have for each other , more meaningful than anything he could ever hope to find on the streets of new york . kubrick <POS> elicits wonderful performances </POS> from both cruise and kidman . tom is completely convincing as dr . harford , a man who seems guided solely by destiny , with no control of the course his life will take . nicole projects a quiet intensity as the jittery yet aggressive wife and her performance is <POS> stunningly effective </POS> : she's headed for an oscar nod . the movie has some help from <POS> a similarly strong supporting cast </POS> , at the head of which is director-cum-thespian sidney pollock , enigmatic and articulate as harford's mysterious friend . eyes wide shut is not perfect : the last hour could have used a slightly more scissor-happy editor and both cruise and kidman are too good- looking for me to believe that either would have a very strong temptation to philander . still , this is an important work from a great director , and while it may not be on par with some of stanley kubrick's best it is a worthy final film , a complex exploration of jealousy and faithfulness . ? 1999 eugene novikov&#137 ;
