'Deep Water' Review: Unintentionally the Most Surprising Dark Comedy of 2022
With a pedigree of talent behind the lens, and a steamy pair of former lovers in front, Hulu intended their erotic-thriller ‘Deep Water’ to be much deeper than it is
It has been two decades since prolific director, Adrian Lyne has helmed a film. His last entry, 2002’s Unfaithful was at the time, a concrete bookend on thirty year career. A career that redefined sultry, lubricious thrillers and constantly challenged his protagonists and audiences when it came to the confines of sex, love and marriage. His iconic films such as 9 1/2 Weeks, Indecent Proposal and Fatal Attraction, were synonymous with the steamy movement of the 1980s and early 90s, and were half the reason my parents couldn’t start watching their rented VHS copy until well into the midnight hours of a weekend.
For the man to come back after 20 years seems like such a specific circumstance. His most justifiably controversial film, Lolita was already behind him when he introduced Olivier Martinez as a sex symbol to American audiences in Unfaithful, and reintroduced Richard Gere as a man most woman would die to be married to, save perhaps Diane Lane. Yet perhaps there is the key; Lyne has made a career of creating absolutely volcanic erotic thrillers, typically centred around a married family where an affair hurls chaos into otherwise perfect martial bliss. If you skim the surface of Deep Water’s pool, you get just that. Ben Affleck plays Vic, a man enjoying early retirement as he once invented a microchip the American military uses in their drones. A lucrative invention that now allows Vic to frolic in his artistic endeavours, attend never ending parties filled with beautiful rich people, take care of his young daughter, and worship his wife, Melinda, played by Ana de Armas. Of course, audiences discover very quickly Vic and Melinda do not have the perfect marriage, only perhaps, perfect for one another.
One of the major shortfalls of Deep Water is the fact that almost immediately, the audience has no one to cheer for. This isn’t necessarily something new to Lyne films, as mentioned, as most of the characters he gravitates towards are morally grey at best, but Vic and Melinda are arguably too dark a shade of grey. We immediately see her flaunt her infidelities in the face of everyone who cares to see. Melinda seems childish, selfish, and a terrible mother, and so the moral scale tips slightly towards Vic being the protagonist of the marriage. Ana de Armas does admirably making a character that is truly despicable in a lot of ways, and very convincingly, but the character itself is already a disservice, as Melinda is so over-the-top annoying to anyone who merely wants adults to act… as adults. That’s not to say that her selfish actions are any different than the actions of other characters in Lyne films, but her character did seem perhaps more unprovoked and unjustified than some of the others. She in fact loves Vic. She has an amazing life. At least in previous iterations of this storyline Lyne gravitates towards, there was something missing from the marriage, but in this, it seems as if the only reason Melinda stepped out was that she accused Vic of being passionless.
This lack of passion is a keystone for the entire film. It’s somewhat maddening to think that this was supposed to be the catalyst or inciting incident of the entire story, but ironically is its downfall. Affleck’s dead-eyed performance becomes an annoyance more than anything. If it was his intention to finally show passion bubbling up to volcanic boiling point, it was not conveyed. Affleck’s performance itself seemed devoid of passion, or any real internal performance method, which again was frustrating considering Vic was supposed to be some sort of sociopathic genius. Vic’s character became increasingly exasperating, even when he acted upon his anger. This word may be overused by toxic internet personas trying to prove their own masculinity, but Vic is in fact, a cuckold for most of this film. Regardless of how what you may think about how he chooses to deal with the situation, it is already too late. Vic is as much to blame for the situation as Melinda is, and at that point, there is no one to cheer for. The audience is left witnessing the same comedically-quick cycle of infidelity, murderous rage and a mysterious disappearance of one of Miranda’s boy-toys; the rage building behind our dead eyes much like it is with Affleck on screen. What is perhaps most surprising and shocking is the lack of passion from every single sex scene on screen. Having a real couple that arguably had to have had some passion off screen present themselves as two dead souls suddenly aroused by the frustration they inflict on one another was extremely off putting.
The dispassionate thread is sewn throughout. Supporting performance by Dash Mihok, Lil Rey Howry and Kristin Connolly are wasted; their characters are merely plot devices used to spout exposition about what people are saying about Melinda, what people are saying about Vic, or to defend their rich friends’ character. Tracy Letts as writer Don Wilson was perhaps the weakest entry of the bunch. Wilson, upon first meeting Vic is almost immediately onto the fact that Vic is no hero; that any man who designs microchips for weapons of mass destruction has to be evil, and therefor capable of murder. He is touted as the Sherlock to Vic’s Moriarty, or perhaps the other way around, because as mentioned, with no one to cheer for, there’s really no one to cheer against. Both characters and their alleged rivalry was just as tepid and passionless as the marital issues between Vic and Melinda.
The film culminates in perhaps one of the most unintentional hilarious ‘climaxes’ ever put into an erotic thriller, and that includes Lyne’s previous all-white, bath-water-soaked cat-fight with a half-drown Glenn Close popping back to life for one last attack in Fatal Attraction. Less we forget. The ending of Deep Water was so awkward, so slapped together to seemingly just end the film, it can only be described as an uproarious version of Thelma & Louise. It seems that you can take the filmmaker out of the 90s, but you can’t take the 90s out of the filmmaker. It will be a tough argument for anyone that says that Affleck in the climax of that film was not playing it for laughs. Realistically, it seems the whole film was merely for laughs, as much of it resulted in a chuckle as indiscreet as Melinda’s affairs. Perhaps it will challenge how people define marriage, perhaps it is intended as a metaphorical study of the toxic games married couples play with one another, but in the end, the characters and the film just feel plain toxic.