MovieChat Forums > Eyes Wide Shut (1999) Discussion > Goofy newspaper goof/other stuff

Goofy newspaper goof/other stuff

posted 8 years ago by wrs6565
6 replies | jump to latest

1)You know when Cruise reads the "Ex-beauty queen in drug overdose" article? Pause and take a look at the newspaper article when it's on screen--not only will you see that several lines of type have been repeated or copy-pasted awkwardly (already commented on in the Goofs section) but there's an in-joke in there, in the lower right corner of the screen you can see that it says something like "Mrs. Curran signed to famous London fashion designer Leon Vitali" - Vitali, of course, is Kubrick's assistant, the guy who plays Red Cloak (as well as Lord Bullingdon in "Barry Lyndon.") Just wondering if anyone else spotted that.

2)Does Kubrick *know* how stilted the dialogue often is in this movie? I can't tell how intentional he was about it--he was a total perfectionist as we all know, but in the Rainbow costume shop scene, the way Milich rebuffs Dr. Bill by going "yes, with a hood and a mask!" seems to be a knowing wink at the audience in reference to the way characters constantly answer each other with questions and repeat what they say. Just couldn't help but notice.

3)Why do people think Domino doesn't have HIV? Is there some conspiracy theory that her roommate bumped her off or something?

4)Domino is the hot girl from the old Rodney Dangerfield movie Ladybugs!!!

5)Flashback time: does anyone remember before the movie came out there was some goofy rumor that Harvey Keitel had been fired from the movie (he was going to play Ziegler) because he masturbated and had an orgasm in Nicole Kidman's hair?

[–] troooo 8 years ago

Hey, I wrote a post that addresses your second point about Domino not having HIV. I'm pasting it in full here:

I'm watching this movie again and was struck by something that I found quite interesting. When Bill goes to Gillespie's Diner and talks to the waitress, he deliberately lies to her in order to find out where Nick is staying. He tells the waitress "Listen, to be perfectly honest, it's a medical matter...some tests, and I know he'll want to know about them as soon as possible". This is an obvious lie with an added twist of irony when he prefaces the statement by saying "to be perfectly (dis)honest".

Later, when Bill goes back to Domino's apartment, Sally tells him that Domino got the results of a blood test and that she is HIV positive. I found this rather striking. If the mention of "tests" is a ruse first perpetrated by Bill, is it now being used against him by Sally? For what reason?

The scene itself is very strange. It explodes into sexual tension, almost for no reason. Bill enters the apartment and immediately undoes Sally's shirt. He fondles Sally's breasts the same way he 'examines' a topless female patient in an earlier sequence. Again we see a doubling--the doubling of the 'examination', but also, perhaps, the doubling of the lie (medical tests). After Sally tells Bill that Domino has HIV, she offers him a cup of coffee. Again, this is another parallel of the earlier diner scene, when the waitress serves Bill a coffee just before Bill lies to her.

So if Sally is lying, just as Bill was earlier, and Domino does not have HIV, then where is she? Was Domino at Somerton? Did she offer herself as the sacrifice? Who is Sally? When Bill arrives with Domino, she claims her roommate (Sally) is out. Was Sally already at Somerton? Is Sally lying to Bill to protect her 'friends' at Somerton?

As with virtually every other element in this film, it seems to dissolve when logically scrutinized. Everything seems to dissolve into a sort of vapor, the same way a dream dissolves from your memory upon waking.

[–] wrs6565 8 years ago

Okay, that's....interesting. I never thought about the possibility that Domino was the girl who offered herself for sacrifice. And hey, maybe your connection isn't off. It's certainly better than people trying to argue some of the things I've heard argued about Mulholland Drive, or the guy that argued that there are numbers hidden in the hedgemaze over-head shot of The Shining, as well as the shape of an ancient Mayan ziggurat, and that the numbers all added up to the 2012 end-times thing. No really, this guy did that.

I mean, the first time I saw the film, I basically took it as a Hitchcock-type thriller: Cruise thinks about cheating on his wife and goes a little too far, and someone mysteriously ends up dead because of it. This has basically been my thinking about the movie ever since and I've probably watched it eight more times.

I should also add as a note of appraisal: since we almost always see people exit off the right side of the screen in movies, the guy that Ziegler has follow Dr. Bill exiting off the LEFT side of the screen while still looking at Cruise is possibly the single most awesomely unnatural-looking shot I've ever seen.

[–] The_Baba 8 years ago

A lot of the shots in the film seem ''unnatural'' or rather offbeat and unorthodox. Scenes where Bill is walking down the street to him sitting in a car with the thought in his mind of his wife cheating on him.

http://www.imdb.com/list/_OaGg-zdQKo/

[–] wrs6565 8 years ago

It probably helps that Kubrick tried to pass London off as NYC!!! He got crapped on a LOT for that when the movie came out.

[–] The_Baba 8 years ago

Haha probably. He also tried to pass London off as Vietnam that one time.

http://www.imdb.com/list/_OaGg-zdQKo/

[–] wrs6565 8 years ago

I for one think the Beckton Gas Works or whatever it was made a fine decimated Vietnamese city...too bad the middle of that movie still sort of sucks. EWS also could have probably been shortened by about 15 minutes with little loss.