The Hidden (And Not So Hidden) Messages in Stanley Kubrick’s 'Eyes Wide Shut' (pt. II)
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The second part of this series of articles on Eyes Wide Shut takes a closer look at the elite secret society discovered by the film’s main character, Bill Hartford, and how it resembles real life organizations. Was Stanley Kubrick trying to warn the world about the occult elite and its depraved ways?
Note: It is recommended that you read the first part of this series first. Also, gigantic spoilers.
In the first part of this series on Eyes Wide Shut, we looked at main characters of the film and the symbolic world Kubrick created around them. We saw that Bill and Alice Hartford are a married upper-class couple that was not immune to the temptations of adultery. We also saw that the couple was in contact with the upper-echelon of New-York and its decadent ways – a world that fascinates Bill, but that has a dark side, one that is kept from the public. In this article, I will jump straight to the most unsettling part of the movie: The secret society ritual.
When Bill learns that his wife has considered cheating on him, he embarks in a strange series of encounters (which I will analyze in the third and final part of this series), eventually ending up in a luxurious house in Long Island where he encounters a large gathering of masked individuals partaking in an occult ritual. Since he was never initiated into that secret society, Bill was not even supposed to know that it existed, let alone bear witness to one of its “meetings”. So how did he find out about this thing? Well, a little birdie told him.
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