I's Wide Shut

[Gary Thompson]

Given the discussion of Kubrick's last film a few months ago, I thought
I'd point to an article in the Oct. _Harper's_ (unfortunately not on
line, so far as I can determine). Author is Lee Siegel (no relation, I'd
assume); title is "Eyes Wide Shut: What the critics failed to see in
Kubrick's last film." Some excerpts:

"Not a single critic, not even those few who claimed to like _Eyes Wide
Shut_, made any attempt to understand the film on its own artistic
terms. Instead, the critics denounced the film for not living up to the
claims its publicists had made for it, reduced it to a question of its
director's personality, measured it by  how much information it conveyed
about the familiar world around us. . . . Our official arbiters of
culture have lost the gift of being able to comprehend a work of art
that does not reflect their immediate experience; they have become
afraid of genuine art."

This recalls some _M&D_ reviews a coupla years ago--especially the guy
who admitted not having read all of the book before dismissing it.

". . . we are flooded with the kind of art that deprecates
attentiveness, tells us about the issues of the day, and corresponds to
our own personalities. And if a genuine work of art appears that has
none of these qualities, critics impose them anyway, for they fear that
if they surrender themselves to the work's strangeness, they will seem
vulnerable and naive and intellectually unreliable."

I thought it unusual to have a piece that reconsiders (others') earlier
judgments, offering in the process a look at a certain style of comment
that attempts to elevate the reviewer by dismissing without an attempt
at understanding a film or other text. Lots of that aimed at Pynchon
over the years.

Gary Thompson