I feel the phrases about the film above sum up its essence and the way these two elements were often running in parallel in the same scene was fascinating, powerful and, again, deeply weird and off-putting. The iciness is often suggested/emphasised by the slow and deliberate, uncut shots that make up the film which give it a stately and withdrawn feel. I also feel that the two main performers, intrinsically bring this element to the story. Cruise, in my view has always had a cold and somewhat robotic quality about his performances - certainly the ones he is famed for and on which his reputation is built. I think the only one for which that was not true was Born on the Fourth of July where I had the sense that, almost for the first and only time, he was allowing himself to be seen. Kidman certainly can do this - and she was required to do so and thus their scenes together were particularly powerful and often chilling. the fact that they were married at the time (and then, acrimoniously, divorced a couple of years afterwards. Given the nature of the story and the scenes that they had to do, it would have been hard for any married couple to play these roles - and perhaps the reality of their off-screen relationship did bleed in to the film - and perhaps Kubrick wanted a married couple for partially that reason.
Kidman performed the very taxing monologues that she had stunningly well – and this I think become all the more apparent when one knows about Kubrick’s infinitely repeated takes – apparently with little or no indication of exactly what he wanted or indications when the scene as performed met what was in his mind. The ‘Naval Officer’ monologue was probably the highlight for me as a performance.
The Christmas setting, with the garish light of many interiors and what looked like almost identical Christmas trees in many interior scenes provided a strange and powerful contrast with the dark story and relationships. Likewise, the music; often very sparsely abstract, yet very prominent and then scenes where one realised the only music was the sound of silence – incredibly strong contrasts here. And the music for the orgy scenes – so unexpected, so strange and so right!
A strange and disturbing experience which I am very glad I had.