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Having Hollywood’s top power couple to star and a legendary filmmaker to direct doesn’t always mean boxoffice success.

A case in point is the erotic psychological mystery EYES WIDE SHUT, which opened July 16, 1999 via Warner Bros. Directed, co-written & produced by Stanley Kubrick (2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY), it starred Tom Cruise & Nicole Kidman, who were married then and played a married couple in EYES.  

Kubrick’s movie was inspired by Arthur Schnitzler’s 1926 novella “Traumnovelle” (“Dream Story”). Kubrick changed the setting from early 20th Century Vienna to 1990’s New York. Because of Kubrick’s fear of flying, he shot the New York-set EYES in England, where he lived.

Interiors were done at Pinewood Studios, just outside of London and Kubrick had a look-alike version built there of New York’s Greenwich Village. The Christmas shopping scene that ends EYES was shot in London’s Regent Street at the well known toy shop Hamley’s.  

Kubrick acquired rights to the novella after reading it in 1968 while deciding on a project to follow “2001.” Initially, he wanted to make a comedy about sexual relations that could star Woody Allen or Steve Martin. By the ’80s, his casting possibilities included Alan Alda, Warren Beatty, Albert Brooks, Tom Hanks, Dustin Hoffman & Bill Murray.

The project moved forward in 1994 when Kubrick signed co-screenwriter Frederic Raphael (DARLING). Kubrick got a greenlight for production from Warner Bros. president Terry Semel, who asked him to cast an A-List star in EYES, something Kubrick hadn’t done since 1980’s THE SHINING with Jack Nicholson. At first, Kubrick was thinking about Alec Baldwin & Kim Basinger.

Then, as it happened, Tom Cruise came to England because Nicole Kidman was there shooting the 1996 romantic drama THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY. Tom & Nicole wound up visiting Kubrick at his stately 18th Century estate, Childwickbury Manor in Hertfordshire.

After their meeting, Kubrick cast The Cruises in EYES, somehow managing to get them both to agree not to make any other film commitments until shooting wrapped on EYES. Kubrick was known for moving slowly, but the 400 days it took him to film EYES put it The Guinness Book of Records as the longest continuous film shoot ever.

Kubrick made EYES for $65M, a sizable budget then. Despite its star power and the usual media interest in Kubrick’s movies, it did only $55.7M at the domestic boxoffice. International ticket sales were better at $106.6M,  bringing the worldwide total to a still disappointing $162.3M.

EYES’ controversial and difficult to understand story polarized the critics when it opened, but it’s now considered one of Kubrick’s masterpieces — and, sadly, his last one as he died March 7, 1999 of a heart attack at age 70, just days after giving WB a near final cut of EYES to screen.