What's wrong with this picture?

This post concerns itself with the answering of a seemingly simple question: what changed after Bill's first visit to Domino's apartment? Like those anti-drug ads, or comic strip games from long ago, we may think "what's wrong with this picture?" The chiastic narrative of Eyes Wide Shut allows us several opportunities to observe changes and alterations between duplicate settings. Bill retraces his steps several times in the film. For example, he visits Ziegler's mansion twice, Domino's apartment twice, Somerton twice, Sonata cafe/Gillespie's twice, the Rainbow costume shop twice (more if we include the disguised streetscape), Mandy - the person - twice (or more, if Mandy is the masked woman at Somerton who warns bill on two different occasions to leave), etc. The duplicity (literally, "doubleness") of Bill's odyssey fits with the general notion of "masks" and "costumes." This duplicity is also an inherent feature of chiastic or mirror-image plot structure. 

Part I. Listing Differences

1. First, we only need study the two images above. To the left is a frame of Bill's first appearance at Domino's. The image on the right is Bill's second appearance. The settings are very similar, but I don't think we can say they are identical. The walls are a sickly green and yellow, and the doors are dark blue. One may think of Van Gogh's simple, yet melancholic, putrid palettes. 

A note on my observations of the color scheme: for the sake of argument, let's consider the following: The Bedroom, pictured above, was completed in 1888, but due to flooding of the artist's house, the original was damaged. A second version recaptured the first, and a third version followed. There are minor differences in all three versions - for example, color. Not to go too deeply into an image which itself does not appear in the film, but, the fact that there are three versions of the painting is of interest. Whether it be Monet or Van Gogh, Da Vinci or Degas, artists tend to make copies. In this way, the doubling of scenes seems to be Kubrick's opportunity to expand and develop themes. 

Note on a note: while Van Gogh is a good arty reference, it is also the book Alice is wrapping up as a Christmas present, likely for Bill, during the, what I would call, "Rockwell-esque" montage. The book is enormous. Does Bill like art? Or, is Alice trying to impress him? Who knows how to read this scene. At the very least, the book is ostentatious. But, once again, a thread for a different time.

2.  There's a blue baby stroller in the corner of the stairwell. In the first appearance, the baby stroller appears left-of-center, and the scene quickly progresses to Bill entering Domino's apartment. Domino's apartment appears like one big bedroom judging from the interior shots. We know from the view outside the building that the apartment's location is a logical impossibility - its location simultaneously occupying the lottery shop (my interpretation of the significance of the Lottery will certainly be addressed at a future date in a separate post). So, the whole thing may as well be a bedroom - in image or concept - since Bill's thoughts are surely concerned with the morality and social, familial repercussions of his actions (even before he acts). Given the context in which Bill is being propositioned to enter - for the sake of pleasure, with Domino - we can see the entire lobby and location as a conceptual or symbolic "bedroom." 

Ok.

When it comes to Kubrick films, I can't control how many cans of worms I open.

If we watch Bill's second appearance, the scene is slower. The blue baby-stroller appears in the corner. The camera hovers on Bill, who appears compromised in his intentions, or will. The camera captures the stroller behind Bill for considerably longer. It is visibly in the background, though admittedly, easy to miss. 

2B. The stroller is rotated in the second appearance. This could be an accident. Or, it could be that somebody moved it. Who moved it, and why? 

3. We should note the red tinsel on the wall above the stairs appears in the second scene. But it is not pictured when the camera faces Bill in profile, speaking through the door to Sally. "What's wrong with this picture?" becomes Can you spot the differences? It is to the left of the stroller and bordering the stairs. Stairs are a frequent code or symbol in Kubrick films. I can think of two lines in Eyes alone: 1. "Sex upstairs," which Alice says Sandor wanted; 2. "Victor's art collection," which Sandor says is upstairs. Also, Bill obviously walks upstairs by Victor's guard to a bathroom. This already tells us that "higher" things are actually base, fleshly, carnal - the staircase is an inversion. Bill ascends a staircase to enter Somerton; ascends a staircase to enter Domino's apartment lobby, etc. 

The interior staircase at Domino's apartment could very well be a clue placed visually adjacent to the symbolic power of the actual apartment doorway. It represents, if even in a subdued, latent, suppressed manner, the various connotations of "stairway" or "upstairs" seen earlier in the film. Notably the staircase at Domino's is dark in both appearances. Nobody is coming or going, but Bill is present. Furthermore, stairs function in two ways, no? One travels either up or down. The tinsel appears after Domino's absence. 

4. Domino leads Bill, vs., Bill seeks Domino. 

Is the tinsel a minor suggestion of Domino's disappearance? Domino is absent in the second visit. If we are to take Sally at her word, then Domino has HIV. Also, Sally must think that Bill and Domino had had sex, and therefore, that Bill should be concerned. But would two prostitute roommates not talk about the fact that a customer paid a regular rate for a few kisses? Sally even mentions she heard Bill was a "gentleman." It is impossible to determine what she knows about what went on between Bill and Domino. This casts doubt on Sally's story of Domino. But more on this later.

5. Though not included in the side-by-side picture above, the bicycle is present in the first and second shot of Domino's apartment. It is an old, green bicycle in the right corner of the lobby. Fine. Symbolically I think it is maybe deadweight, but of course, I wouldn't want to rush judgment. But the word "rush" points us in a direction: a bike signals urgency. Bikes are faster than walking, but save one from running. 

6. In the second shot, we see two metal trash cans hiding the bicycle somewhat. Interesting. The baby stroller is rotated, the red tinsel appears above the stairs, Domino is absent, and two trash cans are present. We should also note that when Bill is outside with Domino earlier in the "chapter," a large, black trash bag is pictured beside the steps. At least two large trash bags are seen in the second visit shot, when the camera looks down on Bill omnisciently as he enters the apartment lobby. 

7. The final detail is surely the most curious and suggestive: if we listen with the volume turned up, we can hear the screams of children, as if playing at a playground, when Bill enters the lobby to see Sally in the "return" visit. Where is the playground? Where are the children, actually? Outside we only see solitary figures who may as well be walking manikins, populating every shot of the city street. These people are quiet and brisk walkers. There are no children to be seen. Strangely too is the sound of laughter, but this disappears as Bill approaches the apartment door. The camera rests at an angle showing Bill knocking at the door, with the trash cans in the foreground. The trashcans appear and take dominance as the faint sound of children's laughter disappears. What is Kubrick getting at? Or, are these merely arbitrary details placed to create enough of a distinction between "before" and "after" shots? 

 

Part II. Response and Analysis

I am inclined to think these details are not arbitrary, and that they do reflect some intention on the part of the director, insofar as the director is fashioning the context of a fictional story. But certainly we know Kubrick was nothing if not obsessive with set design, acting, and dialogue. Therefore I think it can be argued that these details were intentional and they can and do possess varying degrees of symbolic power. 

First, consider the similarity or, indeed, duplicity of the name "Lou Nathanson." Lou is the old, ostensibly super-wealthy man whose death prompts his daughter, Marion, to phone Bill, his primary physician. As we know, in the wake of death, lust and desire take center stage. Marion's husband, Carl, who is a near-double of Bill (and whose name alliterates "Cruise"), finally arrives towards the end of the scene. Duplicity personified. After Bill goes to Lou's condo and meets with Marion and later Carl, he begins his odyssey on the street, where he eventually meets Domino.

A note on the name: Nathanson is an implied Jewish name, like Bill's other clients (Ziegler, Kominsky, Miller, etc). 19th and early 20th-Century French "Nabi" symbolist painter Edouard Vuillard painted his mistress, Misia Natanson at her and her husband's apartment for several years. Misia was born into an influential family who patronized the arts - theater, painting, fashion, music, etc. She modeled for many famous artists throughout her life. "Nabi" itself is adapted from the Hebrew word for "prophet," and was the name for a group of Parisian painters including Bonnard, Roussel, Serusier, and others. The Nathanson hi-rise apartment is very opulent. There's a sense that Bill is entering a castle or temple of sorts. The bedroom is reminiscent of the late 19th-Century, with wood chairs, lamps, framed art, etc. Marion and Misia are both "M" names, too. This 19th-century art world reminds us again of the role of the marginal, subliminal Van Gogh book. 

What if Lou Nathanson has a double, too? I'll admit that prolonged experiments in speculation have limited entertainment value. That's likely one of the reasons Eyes Wide Shut has always been on the margins of mainstream entertainment - it is far too long, ambiguous, and dreary to be popular. And yet, thanks to a minute-long orgy scene after what appears to be something like a black mass, it is easily one of the most damning portrayals of American and global ruling elites in the history of film. Anyways.

Consider the name "Bernard Nathanson." This is the name of the late atheist Jewish abortionist doctor from New York. He was a founding member of NARAL, whose activism and crafty lies helped legalize abortion via the Roe v. Wade ruling. But, when ultra-sound was developed, he began to abandon his pro-choice sentiments, realizing that fetuses at all stages of life feel pain. He created documentary films exposing the truths of abortion procedures in the modern era. He became a pro-life activist after experiencing years of intense depression brought on by his performing over 60,000 abortions. While attacking the Catholic Church’s unchanging moral teaching early on in his career, in the late nineties, after several years of spiritual direction, he was baptized and confirmed into the Church (it's never too late).

Why is this story still news? It is almost as if someone or something doesn't want us to know this story. There’s something very chilling about the damage done. In reality, there have been tens of millions of abortions since Roe - somewhere over 63 million in the US alone. The Holocaust resulted in at least 13 million deaths. The difference is who was doing the killing, and how. But the fact remains that far more lives were lost in recent times. Nathanson later expressed the view that abortion was the current, and much more grave, holocaust still happening in the modern west. He called it "satanic." This must have come after he had become agnostic or at least somewhat faithful. As I now write in a post-Roe America, we can't ignore the fact that pro-choice extremists called for the deaths of the Supreme Court's majority conservative justices, nor that pregnancy centers across the country have been fire-bombed, vandalized, and robbed. Maybe this violence and hatred is being conveniently displaced onto the unborn, or, maybe it is truly hateful of unborn (or any) human life. The latter could only fall under the category of "satanic." 

I would guess Bernard Nathanson lost friends along the way. NARAL co-founder and native New Yorker, Lawrence "Larry" Lader died before Nathanson, never changing his tune. NARAL itself, and the advent of abortion, was largely propagated by similar New York atheist ethnic Jews. It isn't a stereotype to mention that doctors who happened to be Jewish performed these procedures - there are factual accounts of this reality, brought on either by financial need, or greed, as was the case for Nathanson for so long. A third co-founder, Betty Freidan, seemed to become uneasy about abortion rights later in her life. A 1996 Crisis Magazine article on Nathanson points out that of religious groups supporting abortion, nearly 50% were Jewish. The anomaly is that scarcely 2% of Americans identify as religious Jews. This obviously suggests that there is a religious bias for the right to abortion. The modern abortion story itself begins in New York, with Margaret Sanger and what would become Planned Parenthood. While Sanger is responsible for advocating contraception, she also believed in eugenics and population control, targeting blacks and other minorities. The many Jewish - and gentile - doctors, it seemed, pioneered far more extreme and desperate measures to address the problem of unwanted pregnancy. 

So, back to the main issue. The baby stroller is empty during both the Domino and Sally sequence. Yet, the trash cans and sound of screaming children appear during the Sally sequence. The insinuation should hardly be ambiguous at this point. The question becomes: is this related to Domino's disappearance? The symbols mentioned coincide with the cipher of Sally as "69" (S=19, A=1, L=12, L=12, Y=25, added, = “69). If we look closely we also see Sally making advances towards Bill, as he walks through the door. 

Her head turned, eyes cast downward, reminiscent of Gayle and Nuala at Ziegler's ball. Sally seems to be seducing Bill. But Bill seems to be playing a chivalric character, the Good Doctor. So he can't be "surprised" that he is being seduced. Bill says "Hello Sally," in lustful way, reinforcing the cipher "69." Domino as a cipher of "70" is sequential to Sally, even though this would be counting down, since Domino appears first. "70" is a sort of perfection because of 7 - does this point to her disappearance? Furthermore, Sally's cipher points to the reality of abortion - killing is justified for the sake of convenience. This convenience is equidistant to pleasure. I.e., it is just as easy to have sex as it is to kill an unborn child. Killing is the means to the end of preserving one's own pleasure and well-being. If I know I can kill (or, "get rid of"), then I know I can pursue pleasure without conflict. The Holocaust, or Shoah, in this way, is seen not as an end but as a beginning. A Holocaust, or, "burnt offering," as we find in Leviticus, was ritual worship for ancient Jews. Countless Cristian and biblical scholars have drawn parallels between idol worship of Molech, the Canaanite deity associated with child sacrifice, and the modern abortion industry ("women's health") whose bio-hazard waste products are incinerated at an industrial scale. For this reason, too, a serious religious Jew wouldn't adopt pro-choice sentiments, just as any Christian and Catholic would not - though, sadly, too many do. 

We arrive at more questions.

Was Domino HIV positive? Could it be that Domino was pregnant? Or, was Domino "sacrificed" by the Somerton thugs? Did Domino get an abortion? Again, we are faced with "experiments in speculation." All we know is Sally says Domino has HIV. But, we know that this could be a cover story. 

I would expand this notion by suggesting these details are indeed "cover stories" for the reality of our modern Western civilization. While Full Metal Jacket was overtly political, and explicitly critical of the US military, the final killing of the young female Vietnamese sniper may hold a clue for us culturally. As I mentioned above, Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood (in Brooklyn) was surely "racist" or "classist" by today's standards (depending on who you ask) and endorsed eugenics via contraception. Though she opposed abortion, she supported preventing "unfit" life (a contradiction, no?) Her work preceded the Final Solution by at least two decades. Abortions grew exponentially after Roe, even though birth control was available. Maybe it wasn't widely available, maybe it wasn't effective. But I'm not satisfied with ignoring the fact that legalizing a service increases its availability. Marijuana dispensaries is a case-in-point with another activity that was long illegal and taboo. Maybe it is presumptuous to say that having an alternative solution is similar to having a solution. I.e., the logic goes like this: if there's a cure for HIV, then I don't need to worry about doing "X." If murder was legal, would I be humbled or emboldened? The saying about "two wrongs."

Similarly, the number of abortions performed decreases when abortion is restricted or made illegal. Several countries in Europe show this (ex: Poland). We can even see evidence in Texas as of recent - severely limiting a service, or banning it, means limiting services rendered. Decades ago, Bernard Nathanson lied about the number of illegal abortions to sway people in power. It created an illusion of crisis. Further, overturning Roe merely allows states to choose their own fate on the practice. The argument that making the practice illegal will only increase the practice illegally is inaccurate. Facts show the opposite. The same lie is believed today by people like Elizabeth Warren and virtually all other Democrats and a number of Republicans. 

In addition to the occult symbols in the film, the cult symbols that are more difficult to decipher point tragically to the true state of the world. The Keith Haring sign is an obvious allusion to HIV/AIDS which Sally says Domino has contracted. We know that sex workers are disproportionately affected by sexual diseases, infections, unwanted pregnancies, physical and sexual violence, drug abuse, etc. Of course, the film world of Eyes Wide Shut is evil. Because it always seems to insist that it is good. It is constantly deceiving us, confusing us, mesmerizing us. Tragically, the film is un-ironically and unambiguously reflecting an American and Western culture which seems to be getting sicker. The following taboos are rapidly becoming normalized: transgenderism, prostitution, pedophilia, abortion, euthanasia, drugs, authoritarianism, the occult, and all things sexual. The baby stroller, trash cans, faint sound of children's voices, red tinsel, and disappearance of Domino - in conjunction with the death of Lou Nathanson and subsequent lust of Marion - the cipher of Sally as "69," the doubleness of Lou/Bernard Nathanson, point ever downward. Sin and death, darkness and death, violence and death, sex and death. 

But I'm happy that Kubrick and his hired workers made Eyes Wide Shut. Good art is beautiful, but not all beautiful things make for good art. Few films, no, few directors, have offered works that warrant months and years of careful deciphering. But in all my exegeses of Kubrick's films, I've never been disappointed.