B. Monkey
1999 • Miramax

If B. Monkey had received the traditional treatment, it could easily have turned into the usual Hollywood fare. What saves this British import is its settings and cast. Starring as B. Monkey (B short for Beatrice) is Italian film actress Asia Argento. It is only a matter of time before American audiences discover this sublime beauty who can act with the best of them. She manages to convey both frailty and hubris and is destined to make it big on this side of the pond. B is part of a small robbery ring that targets jewelry stores. Jonathan Rhys-Meyers (Velvet Goldmine) and Rupert Everett (The Next Best Thing, My Best Friend’s Wedding) play Bruno and Paul, respectively. Bruno is a young impetuous sort, who’s protective of his best friend, B. Paul, a well-connected man, deals drugs to famous people, has no concept of responsibility and suffers from a distinctly impaired instinct for survival. Case in point, though Paul owes money to the big bad boss, Frank, he never seems to get around to paying him.

When B meets Alan (Jared Harris), a quirky and charming schoolteacher, she begins to realize that perhaps this path of crime and deception is not the one she would like her life to go down. Maybe Alan’s calmer way and sturdy outlook on life are what that B needs. Leaving her old life, however, is easier to visualize than accomplish.

The film works well, largely due to the utter charm Argento brings to the screen. Her vulnerability when it comes to Alan is a sweet transformation from her tougher edge. Alan is not a facial charmer, but his goodness and love of B make him endearing and we can understand why B would want to settle down with him and begin a new life.

There is an inherent fascination with films that deal with redemption or starting over and trying to become the better part of yourself. While this film isn’t the finest entry in the genre, discovering Argento helped make it truly enjoyable.

Eyes Wide Shut
1999 • Warner Bros.

Last July, the much-anticipated (in production for over two years) film, Eyes Wide Shut made its theatrical debut to mixed reviews. Critics had been waiting quite a while to see if respected filmmaker Stanley Kubrick’s latest film would reach expectations. After all, this is that same cinematic wizard who gave us Full Metal Jacket, The Shining, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Lolita, Barry Lyndon, and A Clockwork Orange. Kubrick died just a couple of months before the release date of Eyes Wide Shut and the entertainment world wondered if he had finished the cut he had wanted. Long known to toy around with his films dangerously close to their release date, Shut was said to have been his final, final cut, but few knew for sure if it was. For quite some time people in the film industry had been critical of the length of time Kubrick took getting this movie made. Kubrick was an extremely controlling individual about his films. Filming over fifty takes of the same scene was not unheard of for him. Tying up two huge celebrities (Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman) for a couple of years didn’t help out either.

All these elements couldn’t help but cause some people to be critical of Kubrick and his film before they even saw it. The rumors had everything from Cruise and Kidman totally naked in the film to three hours running time of orgiastic sexual high jinks. What happened next, in my humble opinion, was a case of film critics feeling they had to say the Emperor had no clothes, when in actuality he did. While their opinions may differ from mine, I believe that some of the criticism had nothing to do with the actual contents of the film, which is where it should have been focused. Just because it didn’t live up to some of Kubrick’s more masterful entries, that shouldn’t take away from the fact that the movie succeeds on its own merits, regardless of what Kubrick’s done in the past.

Eyes gives us a glossy, rich-eye view of New York City and the lurid seediness that lives right below the surface. Eyes follows Bill (Cruise), a well-to-do doctor who, after a night of arguing with his wife (Kidman), goes out and discovers much more than he had planned.

Flawed and at times uneven, it nonetheless deftly passes muster as a truly strong film that deserves a viewing on home video. Because Kubrick flew in the face of conventional film-wisdom, it is not possible to watch this film as just another movie. Kubrick was the kind of director who if he put a shot in a film that seemed to run too long or if he decided to linger on a certain word or even if he let the film stretch to two hours and forty minutes, you can bet it born from something more than self-indulgence. There is meaning behind these decisions and, for the most part, it’s up to the audience to determine whether he succeeds or fails. His films often leave doors open for us to shut or continue to peer in and decide for ourselves what we see, or what we think we see.

There is nothing worse than an artist who is in love with his own work; whether it is a singer enamored by her own voice or a writer in love with his words. For the first fifteen minutes of the film, I worried whether this was going to be the case here, but after Kidman’s character delivers a powerful monologue, the tone of the film and of the lives of our two leads, changes dramatically.

Perhaps my low expectations going into it resulted in my liking the film more than it deserves, but more than that there was an element in it that, despite the film’s oddities, draws you in and keeps you interested in what happens next. It is not the kind of film you can easily dismiss, whether you ultimately like it or not.

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