(Nov. 27, 2022 ● Oslin Pierrette)
Something that comes to mind about this film is My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, not the album, just the title. I always loved that title because it really speaks to the unspoken side of humans. I think there’s an understanding, there is a dark universe that goes on in many humans’ heads. Why is it dark, because they don’t ever get the light of day. With the orderly construct of the world we live in. We know the rules, we know what people get judged for. So most of us elect to keep what’s in our head, in our head. And I think that’s a lot of what this film depicted.
We have these ideals of your standardized man and women. And the idea of that is broken down as we go deeper into the depths of the dark fantasies. Especially with Alice. Bill thinks he knows her and how the woman construct works, which was such a generalized sentiment. Then Alice in a moment of wanting to stick it to Bill. Typically visions and thoughts that stay entrapped in one’s own mind, she brings him along for the heavy imagery story, because she wants him to see what a woman’s dark fantasy entails. And it was promiscuous, it was raunchy and gaudy. It was an ideal that Bill didn’t see her as, visibly shattering his pride, and how he thought about her. Leaves him questioning.
After his idea of Alice was shattered, it later sends him on this spiral of a night. One that went deeper and darker into what seemed like a dark fantasy, but he was living it. Into adultery, and prostitution, our sense of order and human barriers are constantly shattering as we go deeper into this dark fantasy. Then the last stop. A weird secret society sex/orgy. It seems so surreal as if it were dreamed up. That’s the only place these types of things exist, in one’s imagination. He’s in the deep depths of a dark fantasy. All types of unwritten human rules being shattered, no barriers. Letting everyone’s weird fantasies come true as they please.
Bill’s weird secret society orgy encounter is directly correlated when he goes home to Alice sleeping having an intense dream. He wakes her up to recall it, because he’s suspicious of what was going on. And she had a night of her going down her deep dark fantasy. It goes into adultery and coincidentally also into this sex orgy situation where it gets weird. And this basically speaks to, we all have our dark fantasies. There’s this untold side of humans that most don’t ever get to see the light of day of.
But what this film also spoke to was the people who actually get to make their dark fantasy come true. The wealthy people of the secret society. This group probably has some prominent and powerful people. Who have the luxury to do whatever and control whatever, meaning the law doesn’t apply to them as much. That’s where this secret society comes into play. Where, to the average person, they are just dark visuals we think about sometimes. These people have the luxury to see out their dark fantasies. And the power to keep them in the dark. Live out their dark weird kinky fantasies. Let that side of them be free. While keeping a hidden identity. Giving them this feeling of living out their shameful dream with no shame attached. Also with Bill vs Alice. Bill actually can go live these fantasies. While Alice only could dream. The luxury of a man being able to live out that dark fantasy of a dream, where it would be hard for a woman having the power to create such a dark fantasy.
But with that, it’s important to keep all this in the dark. Or certain things can happen to someone who would expose the dark to the light. These are powerful people. Maybe the power to make someone disappear with no questions asked, or mysteriously die. So I wonder, was Kubrick dying when he made this film, which gave him the courage to make this film. Because I feel this was Kubrick exposing the dark world of these wealthy people’s secret societies. Many people have heard about very prominent people in these sorts of settings. And some of them probably don’t like the idea of Kubrick making light of their situation. Because why would Kubrick make such a film? What was his intention? Was he a whistleblower? Because it’s strange for it to be his last film. Maybe he had plans for the future, but like in the film, sometimes people can come up mysteriously missing or dead. Especially dying before its release, but six short days after its Final Cut showing.
Eyes Wide Shut is an amazing title, what was his intentions for it? Does he feel that humans are asleep and unconscious to who they actually are. We get entangled in this strive for luxury that we never get to know who we truly are.
Or does he mean hidden in plain sight. Are there things like this happening in our environment that we don’t know of?
Great weird film.