Eyes Wide Crossed

Jokes aside, I created a diagram a few years ago when I started seriously analyzing Eyes Wide Shut. It helped me visualize the narrative arc of the film, which I realized was chiastic in form. I also considered the "arc" to be inverted; the climax is actually a descent. More on this later. It took me probably seven or eight viewings to grasp the fact that Bill re-visits many specific places in the second half of the film. It isn't perfectly symmetrical or anything, but it is more rather than less. Kubrick masterfully disguises or cloaks the scenes in familiarity, confusing the viewer. Clearly, as the Kubrick obsessives well know, the Rainbow is across the street from the Sonata Cafe, creating a bizarre time/story hole when Bill takes a taxi to the costume shop. It is too glaring to be considered accidental. An alternate explanation might have something to do with quantum physics and single entities existing in disparate locations. But that's as far as I'll go here. Far more significant is the basic contradictoriness of the Rainbow being "there" and "not there," because the same storefront is altered and disguised for other sequences in the film. In a way, this one city block is where "it all happens." 

Anyways, the fact remains that, to a large extent, Eyes Wide Shut follows a chiastic structure. This is what this post was intended to discuss. "Chiasmus" means "crossing." Chiasmus is used not infrequently in the Bible, both in the Old and New Testaments. The general idea is that if I say "1, 2, 3," then I must finish my statement by saying "3, 2, 1." In other words, the elements are symmetrical. In poetry, this may mean certain words or certain concepts are mirrored, beginning, middle, climax, and end. In film, and in Eyes especially, we see this in myriad ways. Analyzing the chiastic structure in the film is something I have largely abandoned due to time constraints and competing critical perspectives of greater interest. This analysis would probably take years. Unlike films such as Memento, that seem to follow a reverse chronological narrative and probably chiastic structuring, and seem to be made to be picked apart by critics, Eyes is deceptively simple to the point of being opaque or dull. It answers its own questions and leaves the viewer withdrawn and excluded. Until you start watching it. 

I did manage to begin one spreadsheet which attempted to note the major chiastic scenes, and their beginning and end times. From this point, the problems start. Where to begin? Consider: colors, words, sounds, tempos, settings, character emotions, etc. There is no simple way to categorize the artistic variables which are potentially mirrored in chiastic structure in Eyes Wide Shut. Shot by shot analyses such as those from Kearns are invaluable tools. But offering a neat or clean symmetrical, chiastic analysis is bordering on impossibly complex. Insert: Charliekellypepesilviameme.jpg. I can only imagine that Kubrick was the kind of mad genius who thought about these things and actually made great use of them. Below is the not totally accurate diagram.

 

For one, I decided to add an additional pair of scenes when working in the spreadsheet: Bill and Alice in bed. The couple in their bedroom is repeated twice, if not more. But, this depends on the idea of shot vs scene. Kubrick sometimes makes a scene out of dozens of shots, such as in the billiards room scene. Or, he may use a tracking shot or simple pivots to capture an otherwise significant scene. I wanted to take a "macro" view if possible, and note the general setting, since the specifics can be mesmerizing.  

So, whereas the first picture has only eight paired scenes, meaning sixteen total, a more accurate reading suggests nine paired scenes and eighteen in total. I admit I am biased towards the numbers 9 and 18, as both appear in Eyes as well as 2001, and possibly in others. But I would challenge the critic to find other major pairs or doubles. Once you start looking for doubles, they tend to multiply. Scenes that don't seem to have obvious doubles I've numbered as ".5," suggesting they are fractions within the "whole" order of scenes which have perfect doubles. I.e., the pairing of Bill and Domino and Bill and Sally is a great example of obvious duality, the former occurring before the midpoint, and the latter occurring after. The "singular" scenes I also numbered past 9, up to 15. Bill sitting in Sharky's cafe drinking a cappuccino doesn't have a double, unless we count Bill sitting in Gillespie's cafe, drinking coffee. The problem here is that this "doubling" occurs after the midpoint of the film, which creates the problem of asymmetry. Maybe this isn't a problem, though. It could, I admit, be read as a fraction within a fraction. I.e., like trying to measure a shoreline. One has to measure the rocks, and then account for the tide, etc. There's no absolute perimeter of an island, just as there is no absolute circumference of a bagel. A more accurate measurement relies on more accurate data. When you measure more accurate data, you gather more metadata. The initial measurement then becomes obscured by the fact of metadata and subsequent meta-metadata, casting great doubt on the notion of "measurement." The logical conclusion of this is probably relativism. Big numbers speak to small things, and small numbers to big things. Natura maxima miranda in minims, I was reading: nature is the greatest in the smallest things.

If Zeno's thought were any help, it might suggest that Bill "started" in the film like Achilles, trying to overtake the hare, only to realize that each moment moving forward created a new distance making it impossible to "overtake" the hare. The "hare" would be many things: Ziegler, Somerton, Alice, Nick, Domino, Sally, the Rainbow, etc. Bill seems to be racing against the entire world. While I wouldn't conclude that motion is impossible because of our necessarily traveling "infinite" spaces every time we take a step, I would say to the contrary that we cannot accurately quantify our own movements, that we cannot quantify time, and that these are interdependent entities. The arrow traveling through space does occupy a certain space-time, but, we cannot know what it is to be an arrow. We can only observe. Maybe the arrow possesses an experience of space-time, or maybe not. Maybe nature experiences space-time, or maybe not. These are theological and metaphysical issues, not scientific issues. Therefore we make abstract generalizations about its movement via language. I think it reasonable that Bill is having thoughts and memories that mirror each other, and that these are "speeding up" by the end of the film, paradoxically so, maybe. But this, too, is speculation. A good critic would look at the evolution of the false "flashback" imagining of Alice and the Sailor in Cape Cod having relations. The action accelerates each time the flashback comes, and, it is shorter or longer in duration. Again, haven't looked at this in depth, but suspect that there's doubleness to be found here too. 

On the initial infographic - I haven't included pictures or completed a deep analysis of the chiastic structure yet. When I noticed it, I immediately created the graphic. The locations may be too specific; for example, Bill is at Ziegler's after the first scene. B and B2 could simply be labeled "Ziegler's" to simplify this. Ziegler's billiards room then might be a secondary specific location which mirrors Ziegler's bathroom, a secondary location in "B." But, like I said, this level of detail can only be accomplished with a spreadsheet and likely hundreds of hours of work. Which I'm not sure I want to do. One reason I might not want to is simple: consider that I placed Red Cloak/Somerton at a low point, representing evil, and the underworld. Now, this also means that Bill's "ascent" returns him only to the same "plane" he was before. Maybe it's ignorance, maybe it's his being deceived by people he knows and loves. It's uncertain whether he has learned anything. I can't help but wonder whether the chiastic structure connotes the cross and the idea of persecution. I also can't help but see that, for the viewer, Somerton should actually be at a high point, as it more or less symbolizes the climax of the film in the middle. Maybe the billiards scene is the climax, but it merely points directly back to the center of the film and hence, the conflict: Somerton. In this way, we can also elevate Somerton. 

Sadly and strangely, this reveals some clues regarding the extent to which Freemasonry (or other secret societies) is being alluded to in the film. Seen this way, literally, we have the idea of an inversion taking place. In the film, the feeling is very much linear without depth or height; the ambiguity and aesthetic tone remains very consistent. But, reading the story, considering the "depths" to which Bill falls, I think we can see the halfway point as an absolute low point. The sad irony is that, for these societies or groups, run by the wealthiest and most powerful people in the world, as is suggested by Victor, this is the high point. I think of the words in Philippians 3:19: "Their end is destruction; their god is the belly; and their glory is in their shame; their minds are set on earthly things." Mostly, the last two lines speak volumes about false or idolatrous worship, about disordered devotion. 

But man is not an end in himself. Masons may disagree. Secular humanists may disagree. Atheists may disagree. Malthusians and climate hysterics may disagree. And this, too, is the point. The point is materialism. Matter as the only certainty, and this one certainty elevated irrationally to the end of deification in the setting of the occult. Yet, we have to be careful here, too. Kubrick may have shown us the occult, be he also showed us the cult. Cult is public, unlike occult, which is kept hidden. The real puzzle here is deciphering what is cult and what is occult. Unsurprisingly, this is difficult to do, as the premise of Eyes so often seems to be that the cult is actually occult, and the occult is cult! Again, this may lead us back to the idea of inversion, of high and low, "as above, so below," as certain occultists say. 

I also can't help but notice the weird black and blue shadows on the wall above the stairs. The wall basically a down-pointing triangle positioned directly above an up-pointing stairway. In the same way as my experimental diagram, we seem to have a crossing of "above" and "below." 

The masonic logo incorporates a triangle and an inverted triangle. Imagined this way, we would see a Star of David in this logo.

And in this way, unhealthy conspiracy theories could abound. On this I can't offer much more, other than that these are some very curious notions that do not simply go away with the neutralizing of narrative chiastic structure. I.e., if we supposed that the story of Eyes has no climax, no descent, no ascent, then we could unsee the triangular form. But this would be unnatural, indeed, contrary to human intuition.

If we inverted the ascent and descent, we would see the above form. Notice that the "returns" do not happen exactly in order. But, it seems that "3, 2, 1" actually do occur in that order. It is important to note that the "toy shop" is not the Harford residence. But this all depends upon what we mean by "toy shop" and "residence," and "toy," and "holiday," and "gift," and "family," "marriage," "daughter, " etc. Again, Helena wants to watch The Nutcracker at home in 1., but is shopping for Christmas presents in a toy store in 1.2. So, this is a mirror, as one can imagine the Nutcracker dolls, the Christmas theme, etc. Again, with 2., we have "Ziegler's ball," which is a tongue-in-cheek way of saying "Ziegler's pool balls" when referring to the pool table in 2.2. The billiards table itself symbolizing Somerton, and the balls symbolizing the victims of the "magic circle," we realize that this is very much symmetrical insofar as the holiday ball was full of strange people, included a near-death, lust, etc. Ziegler's bathroom as 3 also involves an interesting transformation: when Bill is in the morgue in 3.2, Mandy is dead. Mandy is simply overdosed in 3, while Ziegler is there with them. In 3.2 Mandy is dead, eyes open, while Ziegler is absent. Bill is present both times. But, shortly after Bill leaves the morgue room, he receives a call from Ziegler. It's almost as if Ziegler needs to show his face. 

And I never thought of this before: Bill is attending to Mandy's body like Marion is attending to Lou's. The difference is that Marion calls Bill, but Bill receives a call from Ziegler. A topic for another post.