Stanley Kubrick’s last film was this delightful tale of Christmas sex and mistrust. Well maybe delightful isn’t the right word. In fact the first time I saw this movie, I hated it. The film was released after Kubrick’s death and Warner Brothers really had no idea how to market this movie. They tried to make it look like a sexed up thriller. With Tom Cruise searching for the truth against a mysterious organization, it’s sexy and thrilling dammit! While some of these things occur in the film, it’s not really what the movie is all about.

Tom Cruise stars as a successful doctor who is married to Nicole Kidman. At a Christmas party Cruise is called by the party’s host Sydney Pollack to help a prostitute who has overdosed. Later at home Kidman questions Cruise if had sex with the two girls she saw him with earlier at the party. He tells her no. Then Kidman tells him about a time when she fantasized about having an affair with another man. Cruise is upset by this and goes out into the night to try to have some revenge sex.

After a run-in with a prostitute fizzles out, Cruise runs into an old friend of his who tells him about a secret orgy party and how to get there. Cruise infiltrates the party and naturally gets caught. A woman takes his place as punishment and they send him on his merry way. Of course he starts trying to look into the whole affair.

Stanley Kubrick only made 12 movies over 5 decades. Some of these movies have included as the greatest pieces of cinema ever. Some aren’t quite as praised. This isn’t Kubrick’s best film but now that I’ve watched it a couple of times, I enjoy it more. It also helps that Warner Brothers have uncensored the orgy scene. They had previous digitally altered the scene by placing random people in front of everything, making it look a little silly. This was because they feared the NC-17 rating but Kubrick had final edit. So instead of actually editing anything they threw everything and the kitchen sink into the scene to make the film R-rated. It only took Warner 8 years to set things right.