Scenes of Erotica #5
November 20, 2006 | Category: Erotic Cinema, Sexblogs
Stanley Kubrick quite probably sits at the very zenith when it comes to considering the ‘love or hate’ category of cinema directors. It’s difficult to find people who are genuinely ambivalent about him. His portfolio of work seems to be an inevitable polariser of tastes, and for that reason alone, choosing to discuss the erotic aspects of his final film - Eyes Wide Shut - may risk creating a similar effect within readers here.
For those not already aware, Eyes Wide Shut is the tale of Bill Harford, an affluent New York doctor, made flesh by the toothsome Hollywood persona of Thomas Cruise Mapother IV. After a high society Christmas party, Doctor Bill (or should that be Doctor Tom?) finds himself propelled out into a night filled with surprise, sexual- and self-discovery and, ultimately, foreboding, by his wife’s revelation that she - contrary to his conceited contention that she would never be tempted to stray from their marital bed - had once been tempted to give herself to a handsome naval officer during a vacation several years earlier.
In fairly rapid succession, the good doctor - his sense of self rocked by his wife’s confession - finds himself the amorous objective of a deceased patient’s grieving daughter, the potential customer for a tantalisingly alluring prostitute, the victim of some sidewalk rage at the hands of a group of drunken jock homophobes, and the witness to some somewhat sordid shenanigans involving a pubescent girl and two middle-aged Japanese businessmen at a fancy dress store. Ultimately, in the climax to his evening (though not the film) he becomes the masked and cloaked intruder at a secret and ritualistic orgy held at a veritable palace set in the oaky greenness of the American countryside. Each of these events is punctuated by silent soliloquies in which our stone-faced hero pictures his wife being seduced and pleasured by her officer and gentleman lover, all tastefully rendered in washed blue and slow motion, as he makes his way between the stops that mark his journey.
“The most pompous orgy in the history of film” drew much of the critical fire directed at Kubrick upon the film’s release. As Doctor Tom strolls through the grandiose drawing rooms and ballrooms of this majestic estate home worthy of Renaissance France, he takes in vistas of exquisitely decadent - and yet somehow blandly sterile - copulation. Women pleasuring one another in swooning undulations, men vigorously fucking women in Georgian chairs and on Edwardian tables, all for the viewing pleasure of inert voyeurs attired in Brioni tuxedos and Versace gowns, and the full-face masks of Casanova’s Venice.
As with the rest of his cannon of work, there are many different takes on Kubrick’s final film. Some love it. Others loathe it. All seem to find different things within it, either to commend or to criticise. Whether you appreciate or deride his films, you certainly can’t accuse the man of being unprovocative.
As to my own thoughts on Eyes Wide Shut as a piece of cinema … I’m not ashamed to admit to liking it. And as others have disclosed, I find myself enjoying it more with subsequent viewings. That almost certainly owes much to Kubrick’s fastidious layering of ideas and motifs. It’s been described as a film that’s “more rewarding to analyze than it is to see”. Such cinema is not for everyone. Many viewers are dissatisfied with the questions that remain dangling at the film’s climax. Personally, I’m not a fan of cinema that spoon feeds me every single idea that happened to be in the script writer’s head (Michael Bay et al - please, I beg you, fuck off from whence you came and stick to directing MTV videos, would you?) Some have suggested that those questions would have been explored more thoroughly had Kubrick not died as soon as he did after the completion of principle photography. I’m not inclined to believe that’s the case, but I’ll agree to disagree with you.
So that’s the film as cinema. Why have I chosen to include it within Scenes of Erotica? First, I’d like to switch the focus to the players. Confession #1: I’m no fan of Tom Cruise the person, and no matter how I might try (confession #2: I don’t try *that* hard) I find this flavours my perceptions of Tom Cruise the actor. And that’s almost certainly why I struggle to accept him in a movie about sex. It’s interesting to see him acting as man and wife with Nicole Kidman, his then real-life matrimonial squeeze, but there’s still something creepy about watching Thomas in a movie capable of inspiring arousal.
By contrast, I happen to think that the former Mrs Cruise oozes sex. In her real-life appearances, she can sometimes seem almost androgynous, and yet when the role requires it, she exudes a powerful, alluring sexuality. The part of Alice Harford in Eyes Wide Shut permits her to do just that.
And it’s the scenes featuring Nicole that I find truly arousing, and why I include the film here. Yes, the orgy is grand, even majestic, but ultimately, it’s a cliché. The women are all physically perfect, yet rendered anonymous by their masks. “An adolescent imagining of how rich men get their rocks off” is one interpretation. There’s a powerful ring of truth to that assessment. I have a sneaking suspicion that such gatherings might quickly become blasé. Where’s the desire, the intensity, the perspiring lust? Yes, it makes for a memorable vista, but the characters are marionettes, too controlled and detached for my tastes. Even so, since there’s still a thick slice of the adolescent within me, I know that were I invited to such a soiree, I’d accept without a thought. At least once.
No, for me, the true eroticism of the film lies with Ms Kidman. The opening scene, where, with her back to the camera, she allows a rejected choice of evening dress to slide down her body, leaving her standing in the bathroom wearing a pair of black slingbacks, left me breathless. It’s not just that Nicole has a superb body; it’s the way she uses it, delights in it. Oh, the arrogant poise of her naked form. It speaks of a woman highly sexual and sensual. It made me hunger for her the very first time I glimpsed it, and the passing of time has done nothing to dilute those feelings.
And those imagined scenes of her surrender to her uniformed Lothario … they made me hungry too. I suspect that owes a great deal to the ingrained desires I’ve mentioned previously. It can be both stirring and disconcerting when an image conceived by someone else’s mind connects so resonantly with your own secret desires. Overtly, Dr Bill is torturing himself as he imagines his wife removing her panties for her lover, allowing him to pleasure her sex, to undress her, caress her and finally fuck her. Overtly. But within his stinging psyche … is he perhaps a little aroused too? Aroused by the realisation that his wife is a sexual being in her own right? Aroused by the power of her sexuality, the rapaciousness of her appetite. In his place, that would certainly have been one of the avenues my thoughts took.
Eyes Wide Shut is a film that looks at the emptiness and amorality that can overcome people if they allow it too. But it’s a film that also looks at how sex - no matter how positively or negatively we may care to view it - drives us all.
Here’s to the ride.
8 Comments
Trackbacks
-
Search
-
Erotic Cinema Recommendations
Comments Total
Get your Badge!
Things to See
Things people said....
"...happens to be the best erotic blog out there, you will not find a higher quality erotic sex blog."Uncool
"...perhaps the best male erotica writer in the blogosphere."
Polyamorously Perverse
"...finally a male erotic author who knows how to describe nuances of sight, sound, smell, texture, who knows how to build up a story, build up tension and who finds all the right words at the right time. And finally an author who can balance so very well along the fine tightrope between erotic writing, plain smut, romance and sensuality..."
V (a reader)
"...one of the standout ’strictly’ male erotic blogs that are out there, and I highly recommend it."
Dark Scribe Speaks
"This is fine erotica, well written, very sexy, all packaged in a nice blog format that makes me jealous."
Sexy Blog Reviews
"...ladies, you'll be feeling pretty oversexed after you read this..."
Nattyboo
"I absolutely love Easily Aroused...the way he writes makes you feel as if you are right there, a part of the story..."
20 Something Girl
"This guy can write..."
Merz1
"I’ll admit it. I have a thing for English dudes ... and I love The Whisper of Nylon by Easily Aroused"
TGP
"...if you’re looking for something to distract you from the monotony of real life and hope it involves spanking, the ripping of various items of clothing, hot lesbian sex, hot hetero sex, naughty wives, naughty husbands, and the occasional pair of thigh highs, then I sincerely suggest you check out his exceptionally well written blog..."
When the Lights Go Down…
"Call that a Blog? (Ladies, your attention please - you will thank me ) This is a Blog!"
Ms Hermes
"This guy is basically incredible. Literally."
Le Calme Avant l'Orage
"Read this girls, that is all I'm saying."
The Adventures of Miss M
"There are so many wonderful things to say about this blog that I don't know where to begin...Maybe the best way to say it is..He makes me want to have sex with him over and over and over again."
Speak Sexy
"EA has a wonderfully sensual quality in his writings (the sexy beast of a man, grrr!) totally unique in that he somehow balances the sexually provocative flavour of his writing style, fluid and deliciously exploratory, with intelligent phrasing, selective word choice, even his pacing is remarkably concise. Rather well done we think."
We Were Wolf
Great post
Thank you, Erik…
~EA
A great review of the movie. Thanks.
Glad you enjoyed it, Nikki…
~EA
Without going too much into the entirety of the film (it would be an essay for me), I think this film raised more questions (for me, because by the time I rented it I’d seen nearly every Kidman-Cruise movie, so I was over them) about Kubrick: his intentions, his interpretation and his very selection on the two main actors (who I feel didn’t fully immerse themselves in the complexity of the themes within the film).
As a female, I’m not into Kidman because I don’t find her physically attractive, and Cruise was not right for the role. The couple in the story had no passion, either one way or the other, then again I was wondering whether this was Kubrick’s intention, because it was interesting to see the dissolution of the marriage after this film, and the fact that the film took two years to complete was another facet that intrigued me, namely due to Kubrick having a subtle sadistic reputation as well.
All in all, I don’t know whether this should have been the film to terminate Kubrick’s career. Prior to this film, I’d seen both Kidman & Cruise in other films, and I can’t say I was thrilled with watching them. I’ve only liked Cruise in a Few Good Men (and maybe in the Last Warrior), and each Kidman film is just so-so. It took me a while to get over the ‘how’ a film like the Stepford Wives could flop with the remaining cast it had (Walken, Close, Broderick etc), but the main leading role was nothing to write home about. So after watching all of the films, I then came upon Eyes Wide Shut, and more so because I wanted to see what Kubrick did, and to this day I wonder whether it was him thumbing his nose at today’s spate of ‘actors’ and their limited emotional repertoires, because he’s done better films (The Shining, Spartacus, Dr Strangeglove) with outstanding actors.
Now me … I’d avoided the Tom/Nicole hoopla (’Days of Thunder’? ‘Far and Away’? Not in this lifetime.), so this was the first time I’d watched them together on celluloid. The fact that man and wife were playing man and wife in an intimate and somewhat explicit fashion was a draw too.
Did they immerse themselves as fully in the film’s themes and complexities as they could have (and let’s face it - with thirty-take Kubrick behind the lens, they would at least have had the celluloid to play with)? Him, no. Her … well, in my own opinion, I think she did a pretty fair job. I like her as an actress … I think she was excellent in her breakthrough role in Dead Calm, she added spice to Malice and To Die For, and while she’s made some pap since (the aforementioned Stepford Wives, Bewitched) she’s done other good stuff too.
It’s not a perfect film, and it’s almost certainly not the one Kubrick would have chosen to leave after. Yes, he’s done much better, but below-par Kubrick is still way better than 95% of the dirge in the cinema today.
And it did have some eroticism, IMHO.
~EA
I’ve not seen the film, but admire several of Kubrick’s movies, including “Paths of Glory” and “2001.” I’m suspicious of films that require too much “explaining” to be enjoyable, though delight in what I’ve learned about “Citizen Kane” and “The Conformist” (due out next month from The Criterion Collection).
This is a long-winded way of saying I will put it in my Netflix queue and have a look, thanks to you.
I’m glad to have been able to inspire you to check the film out, Tom. I hope you find it an enjoyable view…
~EA
Very nice blog, I’ve enjoyed reading!
I’m tagging you on the “6 weird things” game. The rules are:
1. I’ve written my own list of 6 weird things on my blog…People who get tagged need to write a blog post of their own 6 weird things as well as state this rule clearly.
2. At the end, you need to choose 6 people to be tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave a comment that says you are tagged in their comments and tell them to read your blog.
I’m glad you’re enjoying the blog, AC.
Ordinarily, I’m not a tagging fan - nonetheless, you’ll find a full response to your challenge located here…
~EA
Very very hot, makes me wish I was the recipient of such deft ministrations… yum.
I’m delighted you think so, Dragion…
~EA