Stanley Kubrick Called Eyes Wide Shut His Greatest Contribution to Cinema, Why Is It Largely Ignored?

Perhaps no filmmaker has ever benefitted from re-evaluation as much as Stanley Kubrick. As hard as it is to believe, classics such as 2001: A Space Odyssey, Barry Lyndon, and The Shining were intensely divisive upon their initial releases. Within a decade, however, people would realize these singular works of art defied easy categorization and were more thoughtfully constructed than initially perceived.

In a strange irony, Kubrick once called his final film, Eyes Wide Shut, his “greatest contribution to cinema,” yet it’s one of his few that remains polarizing. Only in the last few years have critics been starting to come around to a master’s haunting swansong, though there are still detractors who consider it dull and pretentious. Removed from initial expectations, however, Eyes Wide Shut is, in fact, every bit the equal to the rest of Kubrick’s filmography and a worthy capper to a legendary career.

Why Was Eyes Wide Shut Misunderstood?

Ever since cameras started rolling for Eyes Wide Shut in 1996 (filming would ultimately last over a year), the erotic Christmas thriller was shrouded in secrecy. Stanley Kubrick had become much less prolific in recent years, with almost a decade having passed since his previous feature, Full Metal Jacket, which itself came eight years after The Shining. All that was known was that he considered it his biggest passion project and maybe his masterpiece.

By the time the film was finally awaiting release, the unthinkable occurred. Stanley Kubrick died of a heart attack only six days after screening his final cut of the movie for Warner Bros. Without their famously exacting auteur in their corner to guide promotional material, the executives, still keeping the plot vague, marketed Eyes Wide Shut as an erotic thriller, while also building interest by hyping up the stars, Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, at the time a real-life couple.

While critical reception was positive overall, and the box office returns were profitable, many were vocally baffled. What was advertised as a tense, steamy sexual thriller was instead a slow, dreamlike psychological drama, with the only bit of the much-hyped explicit sexual content occurring in the infamous orgy scene. Even a few select critics felt it was a dull, ponderous end to a master’s career.

Additionally, the build-up of Cruise and Kidman’s involvement also seemed to backfire on Warner Bros., as Kidman, who followed odd rules while filming with Cruise, was sidelined for long stretches of the runtime. And few knew what to make of Tom Cruise’s performance, as he played wildly against type, subverting his image as a heartthrob to an insecure, sexually frustrated loon. Simply put, audiences felt tricked; surely this couldn’t have been the film Stanley Kubrick considered his finest.

Why Eyes Wide Shut Is Actually Great

Removed from these initial expectations, Eyes Wide Shut is as deliberate and meticulous in its craft as Dr. Strangelove or 2001. In fact, part of what makes the film so great is that it goes out of its way to subvert what viewers are looking for. This wasn’t an erotic thriller but a thoughtful drama about intimacy and sexual frustration. The entire point is that the much-hyped explicit content wasn’t there; it’s the only fitting way to tell the story of an emasculated man (Cruise gives one of his best performances, for the record) trying and failing to have an affair.

Admittedly, the context of the film’s conception explains much about the intent here. Stanley Kubrick first discovered Arthur Schnitzler’s erotic novella “Dream Story” in the ’60s. For years, he dreamed of adapting it as a farcical sex comedy and even considered Tom Hanks, Woody Allen, and Bill Murray for roles, which explains the surrealist journey Cruise’s character undertakes in the final film. However, it seems safe to assume that his biggest interest was in the story’s frank depictions of marital complications and that he had a personal attachment since he was married three times and struggled with intimacy for years.

Obviously, much to-do has been made about the secret society behind the orgy and what they symbolize, but at heart, Eyes Wide Shut is arguably Kubrick’s most personal film and certainly one of his most weirdly hopeful. True, the frankness of the sexual content can initially be off-putting, but it serves the story about the cracks in a couple’s marriage. As he’s done throughout his career, Kubrick paints the darker side of human nature (this time, the difficulties of being faithful to a partner) without judgment and with full objectivity.

However, it’s only in breaking down the image of a picture-perfect marriage and coming to terms with said darker impulses that Cruise and Kidman’s characters are able to (seemingly) pull through. The final scene in this strange romance movie (with one of the best final lines in a film ever) displays their dedication to working through their difficulties and reaffirming their love for one another. For one of cinema’s most notoriously cynical filmmakers, there’s an emotional honesty here that’s strangely beautiful.

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One of Kubrick’s Absolute Best

In a career full of iconic works, Eyes Wide Shut deserves to be called one of Stanley Kubrick’s best films. It’s admittedly not for everyone, and if you go in expecting a steamy erotic thriller, you’re bound for disappointment. But put aside these expectations, and you’ll find a dreamlike, bizarre, but somehow weirdly poignant exploration of what it means to be committed to a loved one. It’s so unlike the rest of his filmography, but to this day, it’s still unlike anything else out there, and if Kubrick considered this his masterpiece, it’s easy to see why.

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