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Kidman could see the pressure building. "We were both dealing with jealousy and sex in a way that it was always lurking around. We shot for 10 1/2 months, but we were there for a year and half. That's quite a strange thing to always have with you, day in and day out. You never quite walk away from it. Stanley as well."
The actors say it is difficult these days to see the movie because it was always the three of them worrying and plotting together, but they are determined to preserve Kubrick's final legacy. The film's climactic orgy scene had threatened to earn it a restrictive NC-17 rating. According to the film's producer, Jan Harlan, Kubrick realized that he would have to make adjustments to earn an R rating. Rather than cut his film, he came up with the idea of digitally adding figures to partly hide the most explicit 65 seconds of the scene when it is shown to U.S. audiences. (The rest of the world will see it as Kubrick originally made it.) "There is nothing in the picture that Stanley didn't approve," vows Cruise.
Before his death, Kubrick cut the tantalizing 90-sec. trailer of Tom and Nicole, naked and necking. He knew it would have everyone guessing: Do they? Or don't they? The Cruises aren't telling. "Stanley loved ambiguity," says Kidman. As in all the Kubrick films, the answer to Eyes Wide Shut lies in the seeing.