Movie Review: Deep Water
The last erotic thriller to heat up the box office was Unfaithful (2002), featuring Diane Lane as a woman engaged in a dangerous affair. The film was directed by Adrian Lyne, the king of tawdry spectacle who also directed Fatal Attraction (1987), 9 ½ weeks (1986), and Indecent Proposal (1993). It made nearly $120 million at the global box office and earned Lane an Academy Award® nomination. Now, Lyne is back with his first film in two decades, the psychological thriller Deep Water.
Unfaithful, however, remains the last mainstream erotic thriller to receive a theatrical release, as the pandemic shuffle has relegated Deep Water to a Hulu exclusive. Starring Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas, who were a couple when filming began back in 2019, the film would likely have made a bit of a splash in theaters. An unapologetic bit of salaciousness starring a real-life celebrity couple is a hard ticket for many to pass by, particularly in theaters, where torrid sex scenes have been on the decline for the last few decades.
Now, consigned to streaming, Deep Water feels like just another midnight pay-cable release, a bit of tawdry trash less successful at titillating than drawing titters for its ridiculous plot and scene-devouring performances. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Because, while Deep Water isn’t good, it is well aware of its trashiness and, in its best moments, is a bit of campy fun.
Affleck and de Armas are Vic and Melinda. He is a rich white guy who made enough of a fortune developing a chip for military drones that he’s been able to retire early. He spends his days in the couple’s massive home, giving equal attention to his precocious daughter and the snails he keeps in his cellar, for reasons that are never quite explained but lead to several scenes of the former Batman letting them slime up his hand.
Melinda is a trophy wife bored of domesticity. To keep her coming back, Vic agrees to look the other way as she engages in a series of affairs. Ignoring these is particularly difficult because Melinda constantly flaunts her boytoys, particularly at gatherings in front of the couple’s friends. Vic retaliates by casually threatening the men, even suggesting he may have killed one of Melinda’s previous lovers. To Vic, it’s just a harmless way to play his own mind games, at least until another of her lovers disappears.
For the first hour, the film is a sleek and sordid look at a toxic couple playing vicious mind games. De Armas, in particular, makes a feast of the scenery as Melinda — in increased states of intoxication — seduces, pouts, teases, and flaunts. She has a combustible chemistry with Affleck, whose Vic looks on sullenly but becomes engaged when the two have their private, increasingly heated tête-à-têtes. It’s a diseased relationship: Melinda loves the power she gets from manipulating Vic. Vic knows he’s been made a fool, but doesn’t care as long as Melinda comes home to him. They love and destroy each other, like a Skinemax version of Phantom Thread (2017), with less clothing and more snails.
Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas in “Deep Water.” Photo by Courtesy of 20th Century Studio – © 2022 20th Century Studios. All Rights Reserved.
The film heads into overt thriller territory in its back half, growing increasingly unhinged and silly. There are murders and suspicions, not only within the relationship but without, both from the police and a nosy novelist (Tracy Letts). It raises subplots only to abandon them, such as Vic’s flirtations with the novelist’s wife. The film veers from tawdry drama to something approaching dark comedy as the mind games become more dangerous. A car chase whose grim resolution hinges on text messaging is almost too goofy to take seriously, and Lil Rel Howery occasionally wanders in from a completely different movie to deliver quips that are at tonal right angles to the movie unfolding onscreen.
It is not quite clear what type of story Lyne thinks he’s telling. It’s a psychological thriller that quickly devolves into serial killer shenanigans (it’s based on a Patricia Highsmith novel, so perhaps that should be expected). The film’s plentiful sex scenes are explicit enough to get the internet talking and yet delivered too quickly and coldly to qualify as erotic. There are moments of dark comedy that come out of nowhere in a film that otherwise takes itself far too seriously. It ends on a note of grim sincerity before returning for a baffling mid-credits scene that undercuts any emotional resonance the film may have had. It’s sleek, with very pretty people in various stages of undress, but too muddled and empty to stir up any passions.
It should be said, however, that Affleck and de Armas understand the assignment. De Armas goes big and unhinged when she needs to, reveling in her chances to seduce and manipulate. Affleck is more at ease than he’s been in a while, and there’s a smirk to him that hints that he’s enjoying the chance to play both the cuckold and the intimidator; he’s always had a good sense of navigating between charmer and lout, and he hits a particularly entertaining note of relaxed intimidation in some scenes.
It all adds up to a film that never quite works but is never exactly unwatchable. It’s an erotic thriller that is never really erotic nor thrilling, but works as a campy throwback to the torrid flicks of the mid-1990s. It’s a mess, but as a film just sitting on a streaming service, Deep Water is a painless, if shallow, diversion.
