As his final cinematic opus after 12 years of creative hiatus Stanley Kubrick chose to shoot an erotic thriller inspired by Arthur Schnitzler’s Dream Story. He took the Freudian story set in early 20th century Vienna and transferred it to contemporary New York before Christmas, casting the celebrity couple of Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman into the main roles. They are seconded by the likes of Sydney Pollack, Alan Cumming or Rade Šerbedžija who rendered one of his most memorable performances as an oddball owner of a shady costume rental shop. After wealthy MD William Harford’s attractive wife Alice confesses in the state of slight inebriation that she might be able to abandon her comfortable life for a wild erotic adventure with another man, jealousy sends William on a cathartic night-long journey of sexual discovery and moral repentance. Kubrick’s mysterious storytelling tiptoes along the blurry line between reality and fantasy, which is everything but a safe passage out of William’s daily routine.
- Year:
- 1999
- Runtime:
- 159 min.
- Country:
- USA, United Kingdom
- Director:
- Stanley Kubrick
- Screenplay:
- Stanley Kubrick, Frederic Raphael
- Dir. of Photography:
- Larry Smith
- Music:
- Jocelyn Pook
- Editor:
- Nigel Galt
- Cast:
- Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman, Sydney Pollack, Rade Šerbedžija, Marie Richardson, Todd Field
- Production:
- Stanley Kubrick Productions, Warner Bros.
- Sales:
- Continental film (Slovak distributor)
- Festivals:
- Venice 1999 („Bastone Bianco“ award), Karlovy Vary 2000
Schedule:
12.11.2016
22:30
Kino Mladosť
About the Director:
Stanley Kubrick
Stanley Kubrick (1928, New York City, NY, USA – 1999, Harpenden, Hertfordshire, United Kingdom) is one of the most celebrated filmmakers in the history of cinema. He started out as a press photographer but soon switched to directing films, a field in which he quickly earned the reputation of an uncompromising genius. He has made a number of canonistic motion pictures, many of which were genre–defining, for instance Dr. Strangelove or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), A Clockwork Orange (1972), Barry Lyndon (1975) or The Shining (1980). Although he didn’t live to see the premiere of his swan song, Kubrick reportedly described it as the best film he had ever made.