Questions about the movie "Eyes Wide Shut"

Cafe Society
1

I just saw the movie “Eyes Wide Shut” starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman and came away from it feeling confused and having several questions.

I read the Plot Summary in Wikipedia and that seemed to reveal a few answers but I still have several questions about the plot of this film.

  1. Was the woman that Bill (Tom Cruise) met on the street (Domino) really HIV positive? If so, is that relevant to the plot? It seems to me to be largely irrelevant. Since Bill never had intercourse with her and presumably would not ever want to have intercourse with her, it would seem to me that plot element is irrelevant. Isn’t that correct?

  2. It seems to be unclear whether Nick Nightingale’s bruise was punishment for leaking info about the party to Bill. But, isn’t that also irrelevant? I suppose that just like my first question, it may serve to act as a warning to Bill. But as far as the plot goes, it seems that Nick brought Bill to the party but whether or not Bill returned home safely is irrelevant. Isn’t that correct?

  3. What was the point to the plot element involving Milich? Was it anything more than his wanting to sell his daughter to Bill? If so, does anyone have any ideas as to what that could be?

  4. It seems as if the film ends with several unanswered questions about the plot. Does anyone have any answers to the plot’s unanswered questions?

  5. What was going on at those masked parties? Were they just a big excuse for anonymous sex orgies? What was the point to all the chanting? The film suggested that the people were attending these parties every couple of days or so and. I would guess the men were all fairly wealthy since they all arrived in limos and the women were mostly (or all) prostitutes. But do you think there was something more going on than just a big excuse for wealthy men to engage in anonymous sex acts with prostitutes? Do you think there was something more going on than that?

  6. So, Bill forgot his mask at home and presumably Alice moved it onto the pillow because she wanted an explanation as to what was going on? Does that seem correct?

2

It’s been awhile since I’ve seen it, but I did watch it several times. To my memory:

1) Was the woman that Bill (Tom Cruise) met on the street (Domino) really HIV positive? If so, is that relevant to the plot? It seems to me to be largely irrelevant. Since Bill never had intercourse with her and presumably would not ever want to have intercourse with her, it would seem to me that plot element is irrelevant. Isn’t that correct?

Tom Cruise ***was ***definitely going to bang her, he only didn’t because his wife called in the middle of them starting to fool around, which made him feel guilty and change his mind. IOW he narrowly dodged a bullet.

**2) It seems to be unclear whether Nick Nightingale’s bruise was punishment for leaking info about the party to Bill. But, isn’t that also irrelevant? I suppose that just like my first question, it may serve to act as a warning to Bill. But as far as the plot goes, it seems that Nick brought Bill to the party but whether or not Bill returned home safely is irrelevant. Isn’t that correct? **

The scene near the end where Sidney Pollack’s character explains things covers this. It wasn’t a warning to Cruise, they were just pissed off that Nightingale broke his silence so they roughed him up a little before firing him and sending him on his way.

**3) What was the point to the plot element involving Milich? Was it anything more than his wanting to sell his daughter to Bill? If so, does anyone have any ideas as to what that could be?
**
Although its separate from the rest of the actual events of the plot, these scenes contribute to the overall message of the film. At first Milich seemed like an outraged father, when in fact he was an amoral scumbag pimping his very young & incredibly hot daughter to rich businessmen.

4) It seems as if the film ends with several unanswered questions about the plot. Does anyone have any answers to the plot’s unanswered questions?

Have to be more specific, but like I said everything Sidney Pollack says at the end I accept as the truth, plot wise.

5) What was going on at those masked parties? Were they just a big excuse for anonymous sex orgies? What was the point to all the chanting? The film suggested that the people were attending these parties every couple of days or so and. I would guess the men were all fairly wealthy since they all arrived in limos and the women were mostly (or all) prostitutes. But do you think there was something more going on than just a big excuse for wealthy men to engage in anonymous sex acts with prostitutes? Do you think there was something more going on than that?
**
Again, Pollack was friends with Cruise, who was a well-off, upper middle-class physician, but Pollack was mega-rich and so were all the guys at the party. Yes, it was basically an exclusive super-rich sex party with masks for a certain amount of anonymity, and really hot & expensive prostitutes. And the one who showed Cruise around then wound out dead wasn’t murdered, she just OD’ed.
**
6) So, Bill forgot his mask at home and presumably Alice moved it onto the pillow because she wanted an explanation as to what was going on? Does that seem correct?

Been too long, cause I don’t remember this scene…

3

I want to thank you ever so much for your reply.

You obviously spent a fair bit of time and effort providing me with that explanation and it all seems quite accurate to me and very helpful.

I thought the movie was extremely stylish. But I never understood the point to it all before this.

I think Kubrick might very well be one of the three greatest directors to ever make films. His films are very unusual in that many of them are just incredible masterpieces. Most other directors make a bunch of films and then make one masterpiece near the end of their career. So unusual for almost all the films made by a director to be masterpieces. I just love most of his films begining with:

The Killing - one of his earliest films but if I didn’t know better, I would think it was made by a much more experienced director.

Spartacus - wonderful film that transported me back to Roman days - amazing how the characters were so realistic and interesting to me today.

Dr. Strangelove - so unusual for a director to achieve excellence in so many different genres: drama, comedy, horror. What a talent he was!

Anyway, I better stop now. When it comes to Kubrick, I could go on for hours.

Eyes Wide Shut was the one film of his I had never seen because I always felt there was something “off” about the Cruise - Kidman marriage. But thanks ever so much for helping me out.

4

My opinion is that either a) this was a very bad movie or b) it was a little less bad and the director wanted the viewer to project their own endings onto any of the several sub-plots in the movie. For example, I think you were supposed to see yourself almost having unprotected sex with the super (way-to-hot-to-be-a-streetwalker) hot hooker. You were supposed to see yourself in an upstairs room with a way-too-perfect junkie that passed out before you got to the fun stuff. You were supposed to see yourself dancing with the suave, sophisticated, Euro gentlemen who turns out to be a clumsy gigolo.

As an over-analytical person, I had some problems with the plot holes. The biggest one was the piano player. Why in the hell would this super secret group of super rich people hire some joe blow piano player out of a bar to play for their super secret orgies? That was a huge security breach. Couldn’t they afford a good stereo? Couldn’t they find a good musician and make him a member of their group?

5

I think that the Cruise-Kidman marriage was really weird, and I think that is why Kubrick cast them. It was weird.

6

Maybe, though I believe he picked Cruise because he had heard he’s great to work with. He preferred non-famous leads since they are lower maintenance, but he’d heard Cruise was good.

He also worked with Jack Nicholson for the same reasons, I believe.

So who knows?

7

You’re over-emphasizing the whole ‘secret’ part. Yeah, it was a private, exclusive party but it was just rich people, not CIA agents. It’s not like everyone doesn’t know that some super-rich folk occasionally indulge in excess. They wanted live music so they hired a competent but ‘nobody’ piano player, made him where a blindfold, and paid him an above average fee with the understanding that this was an exclusive gig. If he hadn’t been friends with Cruise and Cruise hadn’t badgered it out of him the secret would have kept itself.

Same goes for Cruise himself. They weren’t really going to kill him or anything, they just wanted to ‘encourage’ him to forget about it. I mean, who or what could he have really told anyway?

8

You make a good point. The secrecy may have been just part of the charade, like the masks and robes.

9

Which is the entire point of “eyes wide shut” - everyone sees everything but pretends they see nothing. The masks enable them to pretend that its really not “Joe, the Banker” .

10

In addition to the more relevant points above, I think you’re underestimating what a piano player will put up with to get a gig! :wink:

11

This thread made me realize something else about the mansion scenes. I always imagined the the pairs of people in robes and masks were husband and wife couples. I don’t know why I thought that. I figured the naked ladies were all high-end hookers, but that most of the watchers were married couples. Given that, I wondered why the need for such secrecy.

But, if you consider that the males were mostly rich old men and the ladies were nearly all high-dollar escorts, it makes more sense.

I suppose I thought way too much about a movie that really was not supposed to be that deep.

12

Upon further analysis, it appears that the point about Domino being HIV positive is important to the plot for a number of reasons.

One, there is a common thread in the film involving the combined themes of sex, lies and death, which come together quite perfectly when one considers that sex can actually lead to death in the form of potentially life threatening diseases (i.e. HIV), and that Bill only decides not to go through with sleeping with Domino after he has to lie to his wife about why he’s taking so long.

Two, Bill uses his power as a doctor (in particular in the scene at the diner) in order to gain access to people, informing the waitress that he has results from some tests that Nick will want to know about (more threats of death and lies). This is important because Domino receives real results from a test that have real implications for her.

Finally, Bill always appears to be thwarted (by himself or others) at every turn when attempting to cheat on his wife. Sally knows he might have slept with Domino so she has to tell him that Domino has HIV and that effectively kills any possibility that they might have sex. Of course, Bill could say that he didn’t have sex with her but that doesn’t really matter and brings up another plot hole which is that Sally says Domino told her how “nice” Bill was to Domino the night before.

If she really knows the truth then she knows that Bill didn’t have sex with her. If that’s the case, why even bring up the HIV? Anyway, sex, lies, and death IMO are the major themes and I’m not sure they’re supposed to be perfectly woven together just used more broadly as devices to inspire the viewer to think more deeply on the subjects.

Also, I noticed that the paper Bill is buys after finding out that Domino is HIV positive says LUCKY on the front page and this is about all you can make out concerning the headline. I think there’s a lot more going on in this film than meets the eye!

13

Yeah. Masquerade parties are popular, but no one thinks that the masks hide identities in any significant way. Too easy to tell from the voice and other cues.

I wonder if it’s the same effect as Stephen Pinker describes here regarding euphemisms, come-ons, etc. Basically, they provide plausible deniability: allowing one to communicate intent without destroying the social relationship if the request is denied. If someone asks “would you like to come up for coffee” and the offer is refused, both sides can pretend later that it wasn’t about sex and maintain a platonic relationship. Likewise, masks allow people to act with fewer inhibitions while allowing for the possibility that it was someone else behind it (even though everyone knows the real identities). There’s a bit of a “I know X, but I don’t know that Y knows that I know X.” effect going on.

17

Sort of a separate topic, but I seem to recall Roger Ebert saying that Nicole Kidman’s character was at the sex party wearing a mask. He said you could recognize her voice and it added another complicated layer in the marriage. I’m not sure I buy it though.

18

And yet his hounddog zeal for trolls missed the one and done post of guyswidebutt. :wink:

20

I have to admit finding difficulty seeing the “spam” aspect (well, beyond the click-baity layout of the linked site). It’s a crazy masquerade party thrown by the ultra-rich. It’s not the ridiculous orgy of the film (or at least this set of photographs don’t depict it), but if all the guests had the time and budget to go full cosplay, this is the kind of thing you’d get.

The “which many suspect are part of the New World Order” reference, though… that’s cuckoo-bananas time.

21

Good gravy, that makes stuff in this movie look downright normal, mundane.

22

my bold - wrong section, then? :stuck_out_tongue:

Spam or no, I always thought it was cool how Dali looked like '75-era Neil Peart.

After a really gruesome 10-day bender.

My only EWS question would be - So how putridly do the notes F and F# really suck, as a result of this film?

23

I’ve seen weirder at ComicCon.

24
  1. Was the woman that Bill (Tom Cruise) met on the street (Domino) really HIV positive? If so, is that relevant to the plot? It seems to me to be largely irrelevant. Since Bill never had intercourse with her and presumably would not ever want to have intercourse with her, it would seem to me that plot element is irrelevant. Isn’t that correct?

She was. And he did. The entire film is Dr Bill trying to see how far he can push his sexual envelope.

  1. It seems to be unclear whether Nick Nightingale’s bruise was punishment for leaking info about the party to Bill. But, isn’t that also irrelevant? I suppose that just like my first question, it may serve to act as a warning to Bill. But as far as the plot goes, it seems that Nick brought Bill to the party but whether or not Bill returned home safely is irrelevant. Isn’t that correct?

It all ties together in that Dr Bill, in his mad quest to one-up Alice sexually has bitten off more than he can chew. Until Zeigler lets him off the hook, as far as Dr Bill knows, he may have jeopardized his marriage, but he may have placed his family in actual danger.

  1. What was the point to the plot element involving Milich? Was it anything more than his wanting to sell his daughter to Bill? If so, does anyone have any ideas as to what that could be?

It was more to set the tone. Dr Bill is venturing down a rabbit hole, so to speak, of a world of weirdo sexual perversions.
4) It seems as if the film ends with several unanswered questions about the plot. Does anyone have any answers to the plot’s unanswered questions?

Not really. I mean, I guess we have some questions about what was real and what was staged. Did the prostitute really OD or was she killed (although I can’t imagine what purpose that would serve). Did Nick actually make it home with just a beating(again…easy enough to check).

Remember though, this whole thing started because Dr Bill got freaked out by Alice’s story about how she almost banged some naval officer. He felt inadequate because of her story and subsequently went off into the night seeking some sort of sexual adventure. His inadequacy was also exacerbated by class issues. He lived an affluent upper-middle class Manhattan lifestyle. Their apartment was dwarfed by Ziegler’s townhouse which looked like a flophouse compared to the Orgy Mansion.

Basically, the “resolution” is that he managed to get back to her without doing really doing anything to fuck up the marriage.
5) What was going on at those masked parties? Were they just a big excuse for anonymous sex orgies? What was the point to all the chanting? The film suggested that the people were attending these parties every couple of days or so and. I would guess the men were all fairly wealthy since they all arrived in limos and the women were mostly (or all) prostitutes. But do you think there was something more going on than just a big excuse for wealthy men to engage in anonymous sex acts with prostitutes? Do you think there was something more going on than that?

Ultimately, they are just wild sex parties for prominent rich people who would prefer to remain anonymous. Politicians, businessmen and the like. The chanting was part of the theatrics. Like a fancier version of a theme party my fraternity might have thrown.

  1. So, Bill forgot his mask at home and presumably Alice moved it onto the pillow because she wanted an explanation as to what was going on? Does that seem correct?

No, someone presumably entered his apartment and placed it there while Alice was sleeping. It is an implied threat that if Bill doesn’t mind his shit, his extracurricular activities will be revealed.