Speaker 1: Hey, film Spotters, Josh and Adam.
Speaker 2: Here.
Speaker 1: Wednesdays are when we drop something in the feed from
Speaker 1: the Giant Film Spotting archive. This week, we're sharing our
Speaker 1: nine from ninety nine review of Eyes Wide Shut. I
Speaker 1: don't know if you think of this as a Christmas movie, Adam,
Speaker 1: holiday movie lately, but a lot a lot of people do,
Speaker 1: and they tend to revisit it this time of year.
Speaker 3: Yes, I think that that is only appropriate and it's
Speaker 3: fitting for me because I may have treated myself to
Speaker 3: an early Christmas present this year by buying the four
Speaker 3: K Criterion Collection DVD.
Speaker 1: Come on, you're one of those people, you, Debbie, does
Speaker 1: this too? November one? You don't buy yourself anything? You're done?
Speaker 2: Hold off?
Speaker 1: You just you can wait till the next till January one.
Speaker 3: Okay, well yeah yeah maybe so maybe so. But Josh,
Speaker 3: maybe you get more Christmas presents that I do. Maybe
Speaker 3: if I don't buy them for myself, nobody you will.
Speaker 3: I'm going to talk about that note.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: I'm just fishing for listeners to send me stuff, that's all.
Speaker 3: Just just send the cookies. I just want baked goods,
Speaker 3: that's all I really want. Can't get that from Criterion
Speaker 3: from September twenty nineteen. Here is our nine from ninety
Speaker 3: nine review of iyse Wide Shut. You've never been jealous
Speaker 3: about me, have you? No?
Speaker 2: I haven't.
Speaker 4: And why haven't you ever been jealous about me?
Speaker 1: Well?
Speaker 2: I don't know, Alice.
Speaker 1: Maybe because you're my wife and I know you would
Speaker 1: never be unfaithful to me.
Speaker 4: You are very very sure of yourself, aren't you.
Speaker 2: No, I'm sure of you.
Speaker 4: Do you think that's funny?
Speaker 1: I really don't bring this up to rub it in, Adam,
Speaker 1: But when I was hanging out with our now mutual
Speaker 1: friends Jason Eken and Brett Merriman at the film spotting
Speaker 1: la made up this summer, one of the things we
Speaker 1: debated was the supposed misanthropy of Stanley Kubrick's films, neither
Speaker 1: of them quite by my theory that his movies mostly
Speaker 1: despise people, and that the giant space baby at the
Speaker 1: end of two thousand and one is coming to gobble
Speaker 1: us all. I honestly don't remember if Eyes Wide Chut,
Speaker 1: the latest film in our nine from ninety nine series,
Speaker 1: came up in the discussion that night. We'd moved on
Speaker 1: from the Brewery. At that point to a nearby Mexican spot.
Speaker 1: Now ewhd Chut is probably the Kubrick film best poised
Speaker 1: to puncture a hole in my argument.
Speaker 2: Here's a movie that.
Speaker 1: I found back in nineteen ninety nine, and upon this
Speaker 1: rewatch to be yes clear eyed about the depravity of humankind,
Speaker 1: but also brazenly positive about people, and dare I say
Speaker 1: even a bit mushy? Iwhit Chutt is adapted by Kubrick
Speaker 1: and Frederick Raphael from Arthur Schnitzler's nineteen twenty six novella
Speaker 1: trom Noval, which they updated to contemporary New York City.
Speaker 2: Then married.
Speaker 1: Co stars Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman play an affluent
Speaker 1: couple and parents of a young girl whose marriage changes
Speaker 1: course during one woozy late night pot smoking session. Basically
Speaker 1: told by Bill her husband that women don't have the
Speaker 1: instinct for infidelity, Kidman's Alice launches into a searing confession
Speaker 1: about a near affair she had with a naval officer
Speaker 1: the summer before on a family vacation. Kidman's monologue, by
Speaker 1: the way, my number two Stanley Kubrick's scenes smart pick
Speaker 1: can't wait to hear what years sire Adam Ellis's eye
Speaker 1: opening tale sends Bill on a strange odyssey through the
Speaker 1: New York night, where he dabbles with various opportunities to
Speaker 1: enact some sort of sexual revenge, including at the secret
Speaker 1: High Society sex ritual.
Speaker 2: He sneaks into that the movie has become notorious for now.
Speaker 1: A lot of this is nasty, ugly stuff, and certainly
Speaker 1: in line with a misanthropic reading of Kubrick's work. It
Speaker 1: was also a turn off to many critics at the time.
Speaker 1: Eyes White Shut only got mildly favorable reviews, and it
Speaker 1: did earn some notable pans, including David Edelstein's for Slate,
Speaker 1: which producer Sam Van Haugren referenced in this week's Film's
Speaker 1: Body newsletter. Kubrick himself, it's worth noting, died shortly before
Speaker 1: the film's release and didn't get to see its reception.
Speaker 1: And yet if you stick with the picture, if you
Speaker 1: make it through the masked orgy to the moment when
Speaker 1: Bill drops his mask in response to Alice dropping hers,
Speaker 1: you'll find, as I put it in nineteen ninety nine,
Speaker 1: possibly the most moral movie ever to show this much skin.
Speaker 1: I think it portrays marriage as something difficult, yes, but
Speaker 1: also sensual and ultimately precious. Seeing Eyes White Hut in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety nine, after I'd been married for four years,
Speaker 1: I found that interesting encouraging. Watching it again in twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: after twenty four years of marriage, it nearly wrecked me.
Speaker 1: I honestly let out a tiary gufaw at Kidman's perfect
Speaker 1: final line. This struck me as devastatingly romantic. So Adam
Speaker 1: am I wrong? Which means maybe Jason and Brett might
Speaker 1: be right about Kubrick. Or did you too find this
Speaker 1: odd sex odyssey from one of our quote unquote coldest
Speaker 1: tours to be a work of real tenderness, passion, and compassion.
Speaker 3: I would love nothing more than to tell you that
Speaker 3: you're wrong, But in this case, you are dead on.
Speaker 3: And I love starting with this because it gets right
Speaker 3: at the heart of what I too, appreciate so much
Speaker 3: about this movie. And I suppose the answer could depend
Speaker 3: on one's definition of romantic. But the counter to your
Speaker 3: take is pretty simple. This is a movie about a
Speaker 3: married couple who don't share a ton of screen time
Speaker 3: when they're together. Most of the wife's dialogue, Alice, as
Speaker 3: you said, played by Kidman, concerns, fantasies about cheating with
Speaker 3: other men, in one instance, so many men she can't count,
Speaker 3: and ultimately trying to humiliate her husband when they aren't together.
Speaker 3: The husband is trying to actually cheat with other women.
Speaker 3: He's consistently thwarted, but he's trying. So sure, Josh, that
Speaker 3: sounds really romantic.
Speaker 2: Here's a great movie.
Speaker 3: The proof that you're right, though, is this. This is
Speaker 3: a movie about a married couple who, despite those fantasies
Speaker 3: and thwarted attempts, is in a much healthier, honest place
Speaker 3: than they were before. I think the key expression of
Speaker 3: that sentiment comes in Alice's lines near the end of
Speaker 3: the film when she says, the important thing is we're
Speaker 3: awake now and hopefully for a long time to come.
Speaker 3: And this, of course, tying back into the title of
Speaker 3: the movie. If you set aside for now all the
Speaker 3: talk of dreams and the undeniable dreamlike nature of really
Speaker 3: the entire movie, and I'm sure we will talk about
Speaker 3: that a bit, there's this kind of suggestion of sleepwalking
Speaker 3: in their marriage right from the very beginning. Of course,
Speaker 3: we get that incredible opening shot of Kidman naked as
Speaker 3: her dress falls she's facing away from the camera and
Speaker 3: she's just a stunning, sensual figure, statuesque in her pose.
Speaker 3: And then we go from that a little bit of
Speaker 3: a credit break into the scene of them getting ready,
Speaker 3: and it's a very familiar conversation, probably to most of
Speaker 3: us married people. Honey, have you seen my wallet? Isn't
Speaker 3: it on the bedside table? He kind of groans when
Speaker 3: he finds it. Of course, she's right, and that's exactly
Speaker 3: where he left it. He points out that we're running
Speaker 3: a little bit late. She says, I know, and she says,
Speaker 3: how do I look? And he says perfect?
Speaker 2: Is my hair?
Speaker 3: Okay? It's great, And before she even says it, we're
Speaker 3: all aware as viewers he's not even looking at her
Speaker 3: when he says it. He's really not paying attention at all.
Speaker 3: She then calls him on it. You're not even looking
Speaker 3: at it. He says, it's beautiful, you always look beautiful.
Speaker 3: Doesn't carry that much weight. He might mean it, but
Speaker 3: in that moment, it doesn't really carry that much weight.
Speaker 3: There's very little real connection there, I think, between them.
Speaker 3: Which is it to say there's a wide chasm, or
Speaker 3: that there's a total lack of love, not at all,
Speaker 3: but we do see them going through the everyday motions
Speaker 3: of a marriage. We see it too, I think in
Speaker 3: Alice's looking into the mirror during a love making scene,
Speaker 3: after the party, and by the end, Josh, they've awakened
Speaker 3: to a couple things, the reality of relationships, of life
Speaker 3: there for and as she says, the gratitude they should
Speaker 3: probably feel that they didn't feel before, and seeing each
Speaker 3: other as they really are, no more facades, no more masks,
Speaker 3: and specifically seeing each other as individual sexual beings.
Speaker 2: That's the key.
Speaker 3: I think this is territory that is certainly more fraught
Speaker 3: psychologically and emotionally. It's a little more dangerous, if you will,
Speaker 3: but it's also way more exciting and stimulating. And what's
Speaker 3: romance if not something that should be exciting and stimulating.
Speaker 1: Josh, Yeah, it's romantic because it's a revival. I think
Speaker 1: that's why I find it that way. The other line
Speaker 1: she has in that final conversation you mentioned it to
Speaker 1: be grateful. She says, maybe we should be grateful, grateful
Speaker 1: that we've managed to survive. And there's a keyword as well,
Speaker 1: survive through all our adventures, whether they were real or
Speaker 1: only a dream. And so there's an honesty there in
Speaker 1: a way that you get the sense there in the
Speaker 1: most honest place, still a pretty terrible place. I mean,
Speaker 1: they've got a lot to sort out. It's not like
Speaker 1: they're going to walk out of that toy store where
Speaker 1: they're Christmas shopping with their daughter in this final scene
Speaker 1: and everything's gonna be hunky dory. There's gonna be a
Speaker 1: lot of rough roads ahead, but you feel like this
Speaker 1: is probably the most honest place they've ever been with
Speaker 1: each other.
Speaker 2: They're in their way more fulfilling path. Yeah, and I
Speaker 2: find that romantic. I se with you, but it is.
Speaker 1: It's the sort of experience where there are a little
Speaker 1: dollops of this in a movie that is otherwise extremely
Speaker 1: depressing in all the ways that you described watching them apart,
Speaker 1: I do wish there had been more Kidman in this
Speaker 1: because not only because she just takes such control of
Speaker 1: those scenes she has, which are essentially monologues, but because
Speaker 1: we kind of get stuck with Cruise for a long time,
Speaker 1: who is good as well, Yes, but it is weighted
Speaker 1: far more towards him, and so yeah, I maybe could
Speaker 1: have used a little bit more of her, But there
Speaker 1: are other romantic elements in this that the mirror scene
Speaker 1: you mentioned the beginning to Chris Isaac's Baby did a bad,
Speaker 1: bad thing, maybe more sensual than romantic, but at least
Speaker 1: captures a fire that they do have of some sort,
Speaker 1: mixed with a lot of other stuff going on.
Speaker 3: I think that look, that look betrays something to me
Speaker 3: that isn't So let's get to the performances.
Speaker 1: Because Kidman's looks in this film, but what she gives
Speaker 1: the camera with her face, she's always two and usually
Speaker 1: three mental places at once, and I think that mirror
Speaker 1: scene is the quintessential one for that. We see that
Speaker 1: part of it is an attraction and connection with her husband.
Speaker 1: Part of it is thinking about what happened at the party.
Speaker 1: They just came from the cocktail party where she was propositioned,
Speaker 1: and she's also suspicious of what he might have been doing,
Speaker 1: so that's at play.
Speaker 2: You also see.
Speaker 1: Her seeming to consider all of those things at once
Speaker 1: and asking herself, who am I? Who am I looking
Speaker 1: at right now? And who are we together? Kidman gives
Speaker 1: such a psychologically layered performance here and again with maybe
Speaker 1: a third of the scenes that Cruz has, and just
Speaker 1: makes those so potent so powerful that they do in
Speaker 1: the end for me outweigh the miserableism that we see
Speaker 1: Cruz's character mostly wading through.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I want to talk about the performances I suppose,
Speaker 3: in particular Cruse here because I think you're exactly correct
Speaker 3: about Kidman and her performance. And if we were going
Speaker 3: to redo those Kubrick scenes, having now seen Eyes Wide
Speaker 3: Shut again, I probably would have tried to fit that
Speaker 3: exact scene on. That monologue for me, is the crux
Speaker 3: of the entire film, and I love her delivery of it.
Speaker 3: I think she's off a little bit. There's a sequence later,
Speaker 3: that dream sequence where she's coming out of a dream
Speaker 3: and she goes on another long explanation that doesn't ever
Speaker 3: feel quite right to me. In fact, I don't really
Speaker 3: like anything about that scene. It's a little bit too
Speaker 3: on the nose, and it's Garden of Eden symbolism. I
Speaker 3: felt that Kubrick was going for there, and she somehow
Speaker 3: just wasn't as grounded as she is in that scene
Speaker 3: where the camera is just trained on her and we
Speaker 3: get the those glimpses, we get those cuts to Cruise
Speaker 3: in those close ups, which I also love. Yes, I
Speaker 3: think we get in those scenes, and we get it
Speaker 3: in the taxikap to a little bit of that Kubrick
Speaker 3: glare that he's famous for. It's that kind of almost
Speaker 3: looking down face that you only get from Kubrick, emphasize
Speaker 3: that way that suggests something more than just sorrow or
Speaker 3: just basic sadness, something like true existential despair. And I
Speaker 3: think you get it from Cruse. I certainly felt it
Speaker 3: there in that bedroom scene. So I think Kidman and
Speaker 3: Cruse are both great in that scene and very good
Speaker 3: in this whole film. But Amy Nicholson in that Vanity
Speaker 3: Fair article said something interesting about Cruse's performance that she
Speaker 3: felt like it feels flat. She says, Cruise's blankness makes
Speaker 3: eyes wide shut. Take on an element of Kubuki theater,
Speaker 3: the art form where emotional perception, not projection, is key.
Speaker 3: The whole film feels like an exercise in theatricality, as
Speaker 3: though doctor Bill is not a person but a prop.
Speaker 3: This isn't a movie about a human possessed with distrust
Speaker 3: and jealousy. It's a movie about distrust and jealousy that
Speaker 3: simply uses a human as it's conduit. With CRUs hidden
Speaker 3: in a mask and robe, The tension is to hide
Speaker 3: his individuality in the service of a larger ritualistic machine,
Speaker 3: And she pointed out the critics then did kind of
Speaker 3: pan the performance. It was like, Oh, he's the action
Speaker 3: movie star, and yes he'd done Born on the fourth
Speaker 3: of July, but he's out of his league here somehow,
Speaker 3: and now again separated from that by twenty years and
Speaker 3: looking over the expanse of Cruz's career, I don't feel
Speaker 3: that way at all about this performance. I understand what
Speaker 3: she's saying about the flatness and how it does ultimately
Speaker 3: serve the story. And it gets to the question that
Speaker 3: all of us as critics or viewers have about performances
Speaker 3: in films when they work or don't work. Who gets
Speaker 3: the credit? How much credit does the director get? How
Speaker 3: much of it is the actor and the choices they're
Speaker 3: specifically making. With Kubrick on this film, knowing what we
Speaker 3: do know about his approach, I don't see how you
Speaker 3: can't give the lion's share of the credit or discredit.
Speaker 3: I would say, if that's what you perceive to Kubrick,
Speaker 3: because you know he shot ninety five to one hundred
Speaker 3: and fifty takes of everyone of these scenes, and tried
Speaker 3: to get exactly what he wanted out of those sequences,
Speaker 3: and how many takes that Cruz loved or that we
Speaker 3: would love did he leave on the cutting room floor.
Speaker 3: He wanted something that suggested more detachment that flatness. Perhaps
Speaker 3: it's clearly this is all filling into this overall dream
Speaker 3: like state of this film, and you can get on
Speaker 3: that wavelength or not.
Speaker 1: I suppose this is what's going on with Cruz, and
Speaker 1: you're right Edelstein really went after him in that slate takedown.
Speaker 1: He mostly aimed at Cruz and his supposed flatness. But
Speaker 1: what I think is going on is that Kubrick cast
Speaker 1: him for perhaps you know, the marriage element, but also
Speaker 1: for his innate enthusiasm, the way that he is our
Speaker 1: most enthusiastic actor, and then what he's going to do
Speaker 1: is stifle that and force that to be drained out
Speaker 1: of him. And watching that happen gives this movie and
Speaker 1: gives the performance attention. And notice at the very beginning
Speaker 1: when they go to that cocktail party, that holiday cocktail
Speaker 1: party by Sidney Pollocks, the way Cruise shakes everyone's hands,
Speaker 1: todd Field's pianist, when he sees him again, he's pumping
Speaker 1: it up and down like it's the best thing that's
Speaker 1: ever happened to the both of them, that they're meeting together.
Speaker 1: He's greeting everyone this way, and eventually, as his world
Speaker 1: starts constricting upon him or getting up ended, he just
Speaker 1: gets tamped down more and more. But in those scenes
Speaker 1: where he's supposedly flat, you can see underneath that enthusiasm
Speaker 1: wanting to come out, that kind of energy, that rage,
Speaker 1: but he does not know what.
Speaker 2: To do anymore.
Speaker 1: He's been completely discombobulated, and you see that cruise. It's
Speaker 1: draining away, That smug cruise smile just goes further further away.
Speaker 1: And it's all about that line Kidman gives or Ellis
Speaker 1: gives to Bill in that first fight. You are very
Speaker 1: very sure of your aren't you who's very very sure
Speaker 1: of himself? Tom Cruise, Who's going to get taken to
Speaker 1: the mat in this movie? Tom Cruise the character, build
Speaker 1: a character, but all so Tom Cruise the persona, And
Speaker 1: I think that is what Kubrick is going for now.
Speaker 1: Just to jump back to what you said about Kidman
Speaker 1: and Alice in that secondary when she wakes up from
Speaker 1: the dream monologue, what I liked about it is that
Speaker 1: I was never quite sure, and maybe this can be
Speaker 1: read as an unsteadiness in the performance. I was never
Speaker 1: quite sure what Alice was making up, what she actually dreamt,
Speaker 1: what she was holding back from him that she did dream.
Speaker 1: And the way I read it is she is deciding
Speaker 1: as she's talking to him, how much of this dream
Speaker 1: am I going to tell him? Because you could have
Speaker 1: a dream like that and your spouse can wake you
Speaker 1: up and mind you. When he comes into the room,
Speaker 1: she's giggling. She seems to be having a fantastic dream,
Speaker 1: but he wakes her up and she says, oh, I
Speaker 1: was having a horrible nightmare.
Speaker 2: The conversation circles down to that it is horrible. It
Speaker 2: is horrible.
Speaker 1: So maybe she's being honest and he being out all
Speaker 1: right yet? And so what I like about that scene
Speaker 1: is that that unsteadiness that I think she purposefully shows
Speaker 1: us is that I don't know what I want to
Speaker 1: say here.
Speaker 2: I don't I don't know how I'm supposed to play this.
Speaker 2: It's it's her unsteadiness.
Speaker 4: We were in a deserted city and and our clothes
Speaker 4: were gone, we were naked, and and I was terrified,
Speaker 4: and I and I felt ashamed. Oh God, and and
Speaker 4: I was angry because I thought it was your fault.
Speaker 4: But you you rushed away to go and find fine
Speaker 4: clothes for us. As soon as you were gone, it
Speaker 4: was completely different. I felt wonderful.
Speaker 1: Maybe this is where we can move into the formal.
Speaker 1: I think it's fascinating that we have spent this much
Speaker 1: time on a Stanley Kubrick film talking about performances and
Speaker 1: not really gotten to the form I'm ready.
Speaker 2: This has to be though. I think that's remarkable.
Speaker 1: Though this has to be his most I don't want
Speaker 1: to say effective use of actors, but of all the
Speaker 1: films of his, I've seen where acting plays as prominent
Speaker 1: a part in what the movie is trying to do.
Speaker 2: Is that fair? Maybe? Maybe?
Speaker 1: And that's not to downplay any of the other performances
Speaker 1: that have been given. I mean great performances have been
Speaker 1: given in his films. I just it's I can't imagine
Speaker 1: any other movie of his we would start by talking
Speaker 1: about the acting for this song.
Speaker 3: No, probably not, And as we noted, a lot of
Speaker 3: people would disagree with that, or certainly did back in
Speaker 3: ninety nine. I hate to use the pun here, but
Speaker 3: maybe it's a perfect marriage of that form and content,
Speaker 3: or I suppose in this case, thinking about the camera
Speaker 3: and how it works around the actors and supports everything
Speaker 3: we're saying about these performances, and really how it informs
Speaker 3: the psychology. I think our psychology is viewers more than anything.
Speaker 3: And with Kubrick, I think we've always studied his frames
Speaker 3: fairly carefully. I mean we as in anyone who watches
Speaker 3: a Kubrick film we know to watch closely. I think
Speaker 3: I watch a little more obsessively now in a post
Speaker 3: Room two two seven world, right, that documentary that really
Speaker 3: gets into all those theories about what every single thing
Speaker 3: in the frame could possibly mean and all the symbolism
Speaker 3: of it. And so right off the bat with this film,
Speaker 3: I was doing that. I'm looking at Ziggler's party and
Speaker 3: I'm seeing that eight pointed star that's lit up as
Speaker 3: they walk in and they're doing the handshake scene. And
Speaker 3: then man, we see that a few more times at
Speaker 3: his house. He seems really into that symbol. What does
Speaker 3: that mean? I promise myself I wasn't going to say
Speaker 3: Illuminati again, so I'm not going to go down that path.
Speaker 3: But I did start looking at it that way, and
Speaker 3: you start to notice, of course it does, and take
Speaker 3: long to realize that scene after scene you're seeing frames
Speaker 3: populated by Christmas lights, and of course I start thinking, well,
Speaker 3: what's the deep meaning of the Christmas lights? And I
Speaker 3: completely dismissed it because I said, brilliant observation at him.
Speaker 3: The movie takes place at Christmas, God forbid, people are
Speaker 3: celebrating and recognizing Christmas. Of course that makes sense. But
Speaker 3: the closer you start to pay attention, and you especially
Speaker 3: realize not only does he really continue the motif in
Speaker 3: a way that defies reality. I think it becomes a
Speaker 3: hyper kind of reality with those Christmas lights, you also
Speaker 3: start to notice when he doesn't employ the Christmas lights,
Speaker 3: and there are some key scenes. And also then that
Speaker 3: meshes with the fact that we get in that scene
Speaker 3: when he is at the party and while she's dancing
Speaker 3: with the Hungarian man, he's being taken away by those
Speaker 3: two models, and it's weird. It's almost like something out
Speaker 3: of the movie The Devil's Advocate, when Pacino's devil character
Speaker 3: is trying to tempt Keanu Reeves, and I remember he's
Speaker 3: got these you know, these witches or these demons, if
Speaker 3: you will, who are super attractive women and they are
Speaker 3: tempting him. That's almost what it feels like, because it's
Speaker 3: such a such an odd state. They are just ready
Speaker 3: to devour him as they're taking him away from his wife.
Speaker 3: But I'm watching that scene. What do they say when
Speaker 3: he asks where they're going? Their answer is, we're going
Speaker 3: where the rainbow ends. And then, of course, when you
Speaker 3: see the costume shop that he goes to to go
Speaker 3: to the party, it's called Rainbow. And when they go
Speaker 3: down into the basement and that whole charade plays out,
Speaker 3: it's called under the Rainbow. And you think about how
Speaker 3: those lights tie in with the primary colors of all
Speaker 3: these Christmas lights in scene after scene after scene, and
Speaker 3: for me, it does just all support this idea that
Speaker 3: there's this real world that they inhabit, but it's ultimately
Speaker 3: a fake world, right. It's adorned with these lights to
Speaker 3: suggest joy, to suggest comfort, whatever you want those Christmas
Speaker 3: lights to mean. And then there's this alter world. It's
Speaker 3: a construct too, where this ritual is going on, this
Speaker 3: whole power system is in place. It's a construct, but
Speaker 3: it's where everyone reveals who they really are and everyone
Speaker 3: shows their true primal instincts and their primal desires. And
Speaker 3: in those scenes, of course, we don't get those primary colors.
Speaker 3: We don't get the rainbow colors and the Christmas lights
Speaker 3: in the orgy scene. We get those stark blacks and
Speaker 3: reds in that scene. And how about those confession scenes,
Speaker 3: anytime that they're in their bedroom, it's really striking how
Speaker 3: those are lit right where. Yeah, it's this combination of blues,
Speaker 3: icy blues.
Speaker 1: See when she wakes up is in particular. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: even in that first one you see softer and almost warmer.
Speaker 1: It is warmer, but you see, for example, in shots
Speaker 1: behind them of the bathroom or the hallway, there's always
Speaker 1: this juxtaposition of a little bit of a yellow glow
Speaker 1: with this real iciness that contrasts that which obviously speaks
Speaker 1: to or underscores kind of what's going on with their relationship.
Speaker 1: And when it gets to the end of the film,
Speaker 1: when it gets to that moment where he's about to
Speaker 1: walk in his bedroom, right and he sees the mask
Speaker 1: and he says, I'll tell you everything. He reveals everything honestly,
Speaker 1: or at least we're supposed to believe he does, because
Speaker 1: we don't get to hear his recount of the night
Speaker 1: we were with him. We're going to trust that he
Speaker 1: actually does tell her the entire truth. But what does
Speaker 1: he do the last thing before he walks into his bedroom.
Speaker 1: He shuts the Christmas tree off.
Speaker 3: That's kind of that moment right where this rainbow fantasy
Speaker 3: I think is really supposed to end, and everything we're
Speaker 3: saying about their relationship, this new reality that they're about
Speaker 3: to enter, it finally happens once they finally shut those
Speaker 3: lights off.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and for him then the final I don't accusation,
Speaker 1: I don't know what you want to call it, but
Speaker 1: the final decision is when he does see the mask
Speaker 1: on the bed pillow next to her, which gives him
Speaker 1: that moment of do I play this.
Speaker 2: For more deception?
Speaker 1: You could see there's a pause, sure, like how can
Speaker 1: I get out of this? What can I say? And
Speaker 1: in the face of that, he just sort of crumples.
Speaker 1: So the Christmas light thing is I think you're absolutely
Speaker 1: right in that they are this pretty sheen meant to
Speaker 1: attract and deceive. And that's kind of the nice topping
Speaker 1: how you see, like this is kind of fun to
Speaker 1: play out at that cocktail party where she's flirting with
Speaker 1: the Hungarian, played we should say, by Sky Dumont, great Cambio.
Speaker 2: It's a little longer than a cameo, but he's so
Speaker 2: good in it.
Speaker 1: And Bill is flirting with the two models briefly, and
Speaker 1: I think this is where what we gradually see is
Speaker 1: that the pretty, tantalizing lights and the tempting offer from
Speaker 1: the Hungarian, and the harmless flirtations with the models, they're
Speaker 1: all the first step towards other things. When you get
Speaker 1: under the rainbow where all of the sudden it gets
Speaker 1: really a but it's the same trajectory, and I think
Speaker 1: that's why this is actually I don't know if you
Speaker 1: would ever call this a prudish movie, but in a
Speaker 1: lot of ways, it's like, that's why I call it
Speaker 1: a moral film. I get it in the way it
Speaker 1: talks about humans and sexuality. And what's fascinating to me
Speaker 1: is how the cinematography plays into this the way that
Speaker 1: you're talking about, but even you know, the cinematography in
Speaker 1: that costume shop scene is so amazing. It's possibly that's
Speaker 1: where the Christmas lights become sinister, and you have them
Speaker 1: Christmas decorations on these mannequins, and it just seems perverse,
Speaker 1: like it doesn't make sense there, and sure enough we
Speaker 1: find out it foreshadows what we learn about the owner's
Speaker 1: daughter played by Lee Sobieski, which I totally forgot that
Speaker 1: she was in this as a kid and all of
Speaker 1: a sudden everything curdles. It's like what the hungarian promised.
Speaker 1: Remember their first conversation where he starts talking about the
Speaker 1: romantic poet ovid and kidman points.
Speaker 2: Out, well, you know ended up alone in miserable. What's
Speaker 2: his response?
Speaker 1: But he also had a good time first, a very
Speaker 1: good time. And the question to ask yourself about ice
Speaker 1: wide shot is okay, let's open that door, let's go
Speaker 1: upstairs with this Hungarian, which Cruise does for the rest
Speaker 1: of the film in his trajectory, does anyone have a
Speaker 1: very good time? And where we end up is the
Speaker 1: basement of the costume shot. Right where we end up
Speaker 1: is at the masked party, which is it's like cadavers
Speaker 1: being resuscitated.
Speaker 2: It is so grotesque.
Speaker 1: And like somehow forced to enact some gruesome porn film.
Speaker 2: Please come forward.
Speaker 3: That nine from ninety nine series was so much fun.
Speaker 3: Fight Club being John Malkovich Magnolia, the Blair Witch Project,
Speaker 3: the Matrix and more. And of course, yes, Eyes White
Speaker 3: Shut You can hear all of those conversations and a
Speaker 3: few more I omitted Josh as part of that series
Speaker 3: in the Film Spotting Archive. You get access to that archive,
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