Word: scenes
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...idiot," Pignon (Jacques Villeret, pictured) and laughing at his inability to comprehend even the simplest situations. To make matters worse, that laughter is rarely voluminous. When Pignon manages to confuse Bronchant's wife and mistress, leading to a calamity, the guilty pleasure of dark humor is unavoidable. But that scene, along with a few clever word plays that only the French seem to be able to pull off, is as funny as the movie gets. For the most part, The Dinner Game represents a failure, morally and comedically...
...although the fire alarm kept researchers out of the six-story building until a fire engine checked the scene, the Medical School's emergency power systems kept lights and other crucial electrical systems online...
Kubrick's opening is so numbingly boring that he almost loses his audience before the real plot kicks in. The scene that actually rekindles the audience's attention is the one we've been watching for months: the couple stroke each other in front of a mirror while Chris Isaak's perfect "Baby Did a Bad Bad Thing" messes with the tone of the moment. Though Kidman and Cruise don't have sex on-screen (what a tease!), the short scene is wonderful because it is so loaded. Combine Kidman's glances into the mirror, her height advantage over Cruise...
...begins her speech. Why? Why cheapen the moment? In Schnitzler's novel, Alice is perfectly lucid; she virtually relives her erotic desires for the sailor as she recounts her lust. In the film, the exchange isn't balanced; Alice isn't rational, the emotions are cheapened, and the scene flops. Bill retaliates by diving into an underworld of sexual deviance that takes him far from the Upper West Side. In these strange scenes which valiantly try to capture the dream-like thread of Schnitzler's narrative, Kubrick effectively conveys the image of Manhattan as a series of portals...
...beautiful costuming, the fantastic lighting and the haunting ceremony. The problem, however, is that Kubrick's vision misinterprets Schnitzler's theme: That sex is so deceptive and dangerous because it involves a playout of fantasy. That reality only kicks in once sex is over. Yet, in Kubrick's orgy scene, the mood is menacing from the outset. This isn't erotic sex--this is a museum of frigidity. Sex and death are linked from the beginning, preventing the audience from feeling the lustful charge and understanding the potent connection between sexual fantasy and fatal reality...