Questions posed by EWS

[Robert L. Zamsky]

I suppose that for myself at least part of the problem was that I expected
something truly great (or at least good) from Kubrick.

The orgy scene was simply laughable.  The ritual at the beginning of the scene
looked like it was a bastard hybrid of vegas showgirls and Cinemax (Skinemax).
Most of the people in the audience were chuckling, including myself.  The only
scene that seemed half-way erotic to me was in the hooker's room when she kisses
him -- there his personal boundaries are being stretched, he is a participant,
not an undercover spectator.

My other major fault with the film (among innumerable minor faults), is its
schizophrenia.  First, as soon as Cruise discovers a "dark side" of sexuality,
every single person he meets wants to fuck him, often in the most ridiculous of
circumstances.  This hardly lends narrative credibility.  Second, and worse, the
film becomes a kind of cheesey thriller with mysterious threats from those
present at the orgy.  Did ANYBODY find those threats credible?  You saw some
rich guys' orgy so they're going to come kill you???.  That turn of the
storyline can only exist under a kind of presumed victorianism, and as played
out in 90's Manhattan, it was offensively silly.  What's more, the character who
tells Cruise that he was at the party (I've thankfully forgotten his name), was
utterly unconvincing as someone who has access to another world, who is
delivering a threat/message in order to protect Cruise.  I mean, that character
was just a dork.

Finally, the film got off to a very bad start with that painfully awful scene at
the party.  The scene fails (and drags down the rest of the movie with it), for
at least two reasons.  First, the degree to which Kidman's character engages the
lecher makes her later admission of her fantasy fall very flat.  Second, if
she's going to entertain the advances of a stranger, can't he at least be
genuinely suave?  That character reminded me more of the eagle from the Muppet
Show than he did any Euro-scammer.

Social issues were not presented in the film:  Aids was a clumsy plot device, as
was child-prostitution.  Extremely conventional, even victorian norms of
sexuality and gender roles were entrenched.

Of course, the film does pose narrative questions to itself that  we could spend
forever piecing together -- nifty little tricks and clues of self-reference.
But to make such effort inviting, rewarding, or even bearable, the film would
first have to succeed as craft and narrative.  It does neither.

my .02,
rz