movie review deep water

Movie Reviews

Tv/streaming, collections, great movies, chaz's journal, contributors.

Now streaming on:

There’s a lot of pressure on Adrian Lyne ’s “Deep Water,” a film that was basically dumped onto Hulu after Disney bought Fox and had no tolerance for a movie about horny people. Some corners of the internet have been anticipating this project as a return to “movies for adults,” a genre that has undeniably gone away in the studio production line now that almost every movie has to get a PG-13. And the fact that it’s the first film in two decades from the director of “ Fatal Attraction ” and “9 ½ Weeks” sets a standard for the film that might lead to disappointment. Will the “Make Movies Sexy Again” crowd give some of the storytelling bumps in “Deep Water” a pass or is this going to be further proof that the subgenre is creatively dead? Early reviews have already been divisive, and there’s no denying that some of this feels like it’s been through editing hell, especially the final act. I’m eager to see a reportedly longer version because there’s a lot here that works, including a great Ben Affleck performance and the kind of sexual tension that Americans simply don’t offer in the 2020s.

Based on the 1957 novel by Patricia Highsmith , the genius who also wrote Strangers on a Train and The Talented Mr. Ripley , which should give you some idea of the games being played here, “Deep Water” doesn’t waste time with the “happy days” of the Van Allen union. We meet Vic Van Allen (Affleck) and his wife Melinda ( Ana de Armas ) deep in the misery of a failed partnership. They have stuck together, seemingly for their daughter Trixie ( Grace Jenkins ), but there seems to be little love that remains between the couple. The first extended scene takes place at a party, where Melinda gets very drunk and flirts with a handsome young man she personally invited to the soiree. In a moment alone together, Vic tells the new beau that he killed Melinda’s last lover, who's now missing. Is he kidding? The next day he claims that he is, but the basic machination of the script by Zach Helm (“ Stranger Than Fiction ”) and Sam Levinson (“ Euphoria ”) has been set in motion: Melinda cheats, and it’s possible that Vic kills the guys with whom Melinda cheats.

That’s certainly what Don Wilson ( Tracy Letts ) thinks is happening, and the fact that he drives the plot is a weakness that Helm & Levinson don’t really take enough time selling. Why is this man devoting so much time and capital to his theory that Vic is a murderer? Near the end, he says something about a book, which could be the only reason, but there’s also an interesting beat when Don meets Vic and they get a little heated over how Van Allen made his money—the kind of drone technology that’s used in warfare. Has Vic always seen human life as disposable? There’s a fascinating thematic undercurrent in “Deep Water” about two people who may seem very different but are both users—Melinda uses men for pleasure and to provoke her husband. She says at one point that she does so because of the way they make her feel. These are selfish creatures, two people who give into basic instincts in ways that most moral people repress.

Affleck nails this simmering selfishness perfectly, proving to be a great fit for the world of the writer who gave us Tom Ripley. There are echoes of Affleck's work in “ Gone Girl ” in how he captures Vic’s temperature, the way it rises every time he sees Melinda with a new lover, including ones played by Jacob Elordi and Finn Wittrock . Why doesn’t Vic just give up? The script, especially in its final act, hints at some darker themes that a longer version probably unpacks more but Affleck and De Armas sell this psychosexual dysfunction in a way that other performers would have missed. Lyne knows exactly how to use their physical beauty and sexual chemistry on-screen, reminding viewers how rarely we see this kind of thing between major movie stars. I’d also like to add that I thoroughly enjoy how often Lil Rel Howery keeps showing up lately and being so effective in relatively small parts (he delivers in two SXSW films this year too, “I Love My Dad” and “Spin Me Round”). He’s turning into a notable asset for those looking to fill a skeptical supporting role.

While I suspect the abrupt, choppy ending (with a ridiculous choice for the closing credits) will leave people angry, “Deep Water” had done enough before then to win me over. It’s really a vicious piece of work, a movie made by a filmmaker who is unafraid to see the primal, darker parts that beautiful people hide behind their gorgeous facades. It may not be the comeback that fans of Lyne’s were really hoping for, but it’s a reminder that this kind of movie can still get made today. Even if it may not be tomorrow.

On Hulu today.

Brian Tallerico

Brian Tallerico is the Managing Editor of RogerEbert.com, and also covers television, film, Blu-ray, and video games. He is also a writer for Vulture, The Playlist, The New York Times, and GQ, and the President of the Chicago Film Critics Association.

Now playing

Kaiya Shunyata

Simon Abrams

The People's Joker

Clint worthington.

Remembering Gene Wilder

Matt zoller seitz.

Veselka: The Rainbow on the Corner at the Center of the World

Film credits.

Deep Water (2022)

Rated R for sexual content, nudity, language and some violence.

115 minutes

Ben Affleck as Vic Van Allen

Ana de Armas as Melinda Van Allen

Tracy Letts as Don Wilson

Grace Jenkins as Trixie

Dash Mihok as Jonas Fernandez

Rachel Blanchard as Kristin Peterson

Kristen Connolly as Kelly Wilson

Jacob Elordi as Charlie De Lisle

Lil Rel Howery as Grant

Brendan Miller as Joel Dash

Jade Fernandez as Jen Fernandez

Finn Wittrock as Tony Cameron

• Adrian Lyne

Writer (based upon the novel by)

• Patricia Highsmith
• Sam Levinson

Cinematographer

• Eigil Bryld
• Andrew Mondshein
• Tim Squyres
• Marco Beltrami

Latest blog posts

The Movies That Underwent Major Changes After Their Festival Premiere

Netflix's Dead Boy Detectives Is A Spinoff Stuck In Limbo

Preview of Tributes at the 58th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival

Pioneering Actor-Producer Terry Carter Dies

Advertisement

Supported by

‘Deep Water’ Review: Love and Loathing in New Orleans

An unhappy husband raises suspicions when his wife’s lovers begin to disappear.

• Share full article

By Jeannette Catsoulis

Two decades have passed since Adrian Lyne made “Unfaithful,” maybe his best film, though not his best known. (That would be his 1987 sizzler, “Fatal Attraction.” ) A slickly accomplished purveyor of the erotic thriller, Lyne doesn’t make love stories so much as lust stories — specifically, the way an incorrigible sexual appetite can rip a life apart.

On paper, then, he seems the perfect choice to direct “Deep Water,” an adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 1957 novel about a dangerously sick suburban marriage. Vic (Ben Affleck) is retired, enjoying his tech-derived fortune by mountain biking and raising snails. (Glistening gastropod close-ups suggest this hobby has some ominous narrative purpose; let me know if you find one.) Vic’s gorgeous wife, Melinda (Ana de Armas) — rarely seen without a glass in one hand and a lover in the other — favors little black dresses that shrug off as easily as her sobriety. Vic might be tortured by her flagrant infidelities, but how can you stay mad at a woman who gets topless just to wash the dishes?

Filmed in New Orleans and soaked in boozy parties where Melinda’s public humiliations of her husband earn the pity of Vic’s friends, “Deep Water” ( a French version was released in 1981) is a ridiculous murder mystery that could have worked much better as a study of sexual masochism. (The marriage has no heat, yet there’s sly relish in Melinda’s cruelty and a psychological puzzle in Vic’s pained stoicism.) Alternatively, had the story been set in the 1950s of Highsmith’s novel, when divorce was more stigmatized and alcohol the favored alternative, Vic’s forbearance — not to mention all those parties — might have made more sense.

As it is, Affleck is left with little to play but a sorry, perpetually glum cuckold. When the movie opens, a previous lover of Melinda’s has mysteriously disappeared. “I killed him,” Vic tells the dimwitted replacement (Brendan C. Miller), and we wonder if he’s capable of joking. And as Melinda’s flings — including a cheesy pianist who woos her by playing “The Lady Is a Tramp” — continue to vanish, a local writer (Tracy Letts) grows suspicious. Even Vic’s 6-year-old daughter (a delightful Grace Jenkins) looks at him askance.

None of this is ever less than preposterous. Though heaven knows I’m grateful for any grown-up movie these days, “Deep Water” is in many ways a baffling return for Lyne, whose advertiser’s eye for the allure of an image is repeatedly undercut by Zach Helm and Sam Levinson’s messy, often mystifying screenplay. Eigil Bryld’s caressing camera is fully up to any task his director sets him, but the movie appears chopped into misaligned chunks and dangling loose ends, its scenes spat out as randomly as bingo balls.

Originally intended for theatrical release, “Deep Water” has landed on Hulu , possibly because of nervousness over its themes. Yet there’s surprisingly little sex, and what there is has none of the vividness and tactility Lyne is known for. Like Vic’s snails, who must be starved before they can be consumed, “Deep Water” feels like a movie that’s had everything of interest well and truly sucked out.

Deep Water Rated R for bored fellatio and passionate murders. Running time: 1 hour 55 minutes. Watch on Hulu.

Explore More in TV and Movies

Not sure what to watch next we can help..

As “Sex and the City” became more widely available on Netflix, younger viewers have watched it with a critical eye . But its longtime millennial and Gen X fans can’t quit.

Hoa Xuande had only one Hollywood credit when he was chosen to lead “The Sympathizer,” the starry HBO adaptation of a prize-winning novel. He needed all the encouragement he could get .

Even before his new film “Civil War” was released, the writer-director Alex Garland faced controversy over his vision of a divided America  with Texas and California as allies.

Theda Hammel’s directorial debut, “Stress Positions,” a comedy about millennials weathering the early days of the pandemic , will ask audiences to return to a time that many people would rather forget.

If you are overwhelmed by the endless options, don’t despair — we put together the best offerings   on Netflix , Max , Disney+ , Amazon Prime  and Hulu  to make choosing your next binge a little easier.

Sign up for our Watching newsletter  to get recommendations on the best films and TV shows to stream and watch, delivered to your inbox.

Review: ‘Deep Water,’ an erotic thriller with Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas, runs hot and cold

• Show more sharing options
• Copy Link URL Copied!

Ben Affleck caresses a snail beautifully in “Deep Water.” As Vic Van Allen, the rich, brooding, slug-collecting antihero of this languid erotic thriller, he studies the little creatures as they slither around in his grasp and invites bewildered onlookers to share his fascination. “A snail will crawl up a 12-foot wall to find its mate,” he says admiringly, as if he were recognizing a kindred romantic. Sadly, Vic doesn’t go on to diagram their unique mating habits, which involve two sets of genitalia (most land slugs are hermaphrodites) and the shooting of a special “love dart” from one snail’s body into another. That sounds complicated and painful, if also mercifully devoid of emotional baggage. All in all, Vic prefers the company of snails to that of other humans — an attitude he surely shares with his late creator and fellow gastropod enthusiast, Patricia Highsmith.

A present-day adaptation of a 1957 Highsmith novel isn’t necessarily what you’d expect from Adrian Lyne, the 81-year-old English director who made his reputation with the adulterous thrills of “Fatal Attraction,” “Indecent Proposal” and “Unfaithful.” But while “Deep Water,” his first new feature in 20 years, looks at first like one of his patented hand-wringing, libido-tickling soap operas, it also has a chilled Highsmithian misanthropy that cuts differently than his previous work. If Lyne’s earlier potboilers asked (or glossed over) the question of why a husband or wife would stray from a happy marriage, “Deep Water” playfully ponders what might hold an unhappy one together: a child, sure, but also an open arrangement of a sort that was less common in Highsmith’s era than the present one, in which this updated movie takes place.

But even if they inhabit a more progressive-minded moment, Vic and his wife, Melinda (Ana de Armas), can’t help but raise eyebrows in their inner circle. An inveterate flirt, Melinda pushes the terms of their agreement to the limits: She spends her days chasing handsome young men around their leafy New Orleans suburb, sometimes inviting them over to the house for dinner. Vic, an early retiree, spends most of his time raising their sweet young daughter (Grace Jenkins), riding his mountain bike, tending his snails and watching Melinda’s revolving door of lovers with ever-darkening shades of contempt.

Part of the pleasure of “Deep Water” comes from watching him vent his scorn and undermine his rivals without losing his cool. Affleck, who once upon a time might’ve played one of those rivals, embraces the role of the quietly seething cuckold. Vic plays cruel mind games with one dreamy dullard (Brendan Miller), at one point calmly announcing that he killed one of Melinda’s previous lovers. (Is he lying? In that moment, at least, you’re not entirely sure.) He gets even crueler with a piano teacher (Jacob Elordi) whom he suspects of tickling more than Melinda’s ivories. At a certain point, we learn how Vic earned his millions, and we’re meant to both cackle and shudder: Like more than a few tech bros enjoying an early retirement, he doesn’t mind having a few corpses on his conscience.

There’s more to the story: a startling rumor, a couple of parties, a nosy neighbor (a typically sharp Tracy Letts), a few unfortunate “accidents” and a swimming pool that glows as ominously as the one in “La Piscine,” Jacques Deray’s 1969 classic of sex, deceit and murder. (Speaking of French thrillers: Highsmith’s novel was previously adapted into the 1981 film “Eaux Profondes,” starring Jean-Louis Trintignant and Isabelle Huppert. A German TV adaptation, “Tiefe Wasser,” followed in 1983.) But while Lyne is a self-professed Francophile, the movies he seems to be referencing most blatantly here are his own. As shot by Eigil Bryld, this “Deep Water” is almost reassuringly shallow, a catalog of Architectural Digest furnishings and tasteful female nudity (wayward wife, meet antique bathtub). The slick sheen that has long clung to Lyne’s images, since his days as a director of TV commercials, hasn’t abandoned him over the last two decades.

Nor has he lost the interplay of seriousness and silliness — and the genial refusal to distinguish between the two — that has long animated his work. From time to time, the movie raises the intriguing possibility that the Van Allens’ marital dilemma — her unbridled lust, his thinly concealed jealousy — might be part of some kinky extended role play, as if Vic and Melinda were acting out their own (R-rated) cuckold-porn fantasy. Whatever sexual mind games are taking place, they get an extra frisson from the casting of Affleck and De Armas, who famously began dating midproduction in 2019 but broke things off in early 2021. More than a year later, the movie, which was made for theaters but delayed several times by the COVID-19 pandemic, is being dumped on Hulu with a conspicuous lack of fanfare.

It’s possible, while streaming “Deep Water,” to feel a stab of nostalgia for the big-screen heyday of the Hollywood erotic thriller, a genre to which Lyne and several others — the Lawrence Kasdan of “Body Heat” and the Paul Verhoeven of “Basic Instinct” among them — made indelibly sweaty contributions in the ’80s and ’90s. But the resemblance between Lyne’s latest and those earlier lurid entertainments turns out to be superficial at best. Affleck and De Armas don’t evince much in the way of onscreen chemistry, which I mean less as a dis to their now-defunct relationship than a compliment to their grasp of this particular assignment. Vic and Melinda’s fleeting sexual encounters — a little discreet fondling here, some behind-the-wheel fellatio there — are tinged with sadness and even hostility. Intimacy is achieved only in fits of rage.

There’s a lot of psychosexual layering to peel back here, in other words, or there would be if Lyne were more fully in control of his material. Slithering along as deliberately as one of Vic’s snails, “Deep Water” runs hot and cold; it’s sometimes a self-aware hoot and sometimes a disjointed drag. Even by the standards of comic relief, Vic and Melinda’s friends (played by actors including Dash Mihok and Lil Rel Howery) always seem to be wandering in from a more laid-back, more entertaining movie. Not-insignificant chunks of narrative seem to have gone missing, especially as the story barrels toward its startlingly abrupt finish. De Armas, the movie’s liveliest presence, is also perhaps the most ill-served by all this editing-room triage; she seems to be acting in fragments, as if she’d been directed to variously flirt, dance, drink, scream and slink around in black cocktail attire without pulling the pieces together.

Affleck fares better; viral gossip may have reduced him to a punchline, but time and circumstance have conspired to make him a more interesting actor than he often gets credit for being. Much as he showed in “Gone Girl,” another gleefully amoral potboiler about a loveless marriage, he excels at playing the emasculated dreamboat, the golden boy gone to seed. The resemblance to that earlier movie is instructive. Notably and refreshingly, Lyne largely seems to have purged himself of the moralistic streak that’s often marred his work; for the first time in a long time, he’s enjoying his characters’ awfulness rather than damning them for it. He doesn’t want to punish them. He just wants to hold them up to the light and watch them wriggle.

‘Deep Water’

Rated: R, for sexual content, nudity, language and some violence Running time: 1 hour, 55 minutes Playing: Available March 18 on Hulu

More to Read

Review: In ‘Love Lies Bleeding,’ dangerous lusts and noirish calculations are alive and well

March 8, 2024

Why ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?’ is the ‘truest portrait of love in marriage’

Feb. 14, 2024

Out of time and out of its mind: ‘Poor Things’ creates a world of its own

Feb. 5, 2024

Only good movies

Get the Indie Focus newsletter, Mark Olsen's weekly guide to the world of cinema.

You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.

Justin Chang was a film critic for the Los Angeles Times from 2016 to 2024. He is the author of the book “FilmCraft: Editing” and serves as chair of the National Society of Film Critics and secretary of the Los Angeles Film Critics Assn.

More From the Los Angeles Times

Company Town

After scandal, movie producer Randall Emmett is flying under the radar with a new name

This is what Billie Eilish talks about when she’s not promoting ‘Barbie, Barbie, Barbie’

April 25, 2024

Review: Generic from its title onward, ‘Boy Kills World’ does little to differentiate its gore

‘Rebel’ redacted: Rebel Wilson’s book chapter on Sacha Baron Cohen struck from some copies

• Newsletters

Site search

• Israel-Hamas war
• Home Planet
• 2024 election
• Supreme Court
• TikTok’s fate
• All explainers
• Future Perfect

Filed under:

Deep Water is a movie for the mean and horny

Deep Water asks the deep moral question: Can a drone engineer be sexy?

Share this story

• Share this on Facebook
• Share this on Twitter
• Share this on Reddit
• Share All sharing options

Share All sharing options for: Deep Water is a movie for the mean and horny

Passed down from generation to generation is a piece of wisdom that functions both as advice and warning: Do not stick your dick in crazy. Though this saying is firmly entrenched among bro culture, it applies to receptive partners, too. Complications of ableist language aside, not engaging in sexual relations with people whose worldview you find to be incompatible with your own has likely averted innumerable personal disasters.

But if no one is having sex with “crazy,” it creates a forbidden unknown, an unanswerable question of what lies beyond the horizon of sanity. What happens on the off-chance you do it anyway? Further, what if you actually enjoy it? Or what if you’re the “crazy” in question?

Enter: Deep Water .

Directed by Adrian Lyne and starring Ana de Armas and Ben Affleck, Deep Water is an erotic thriller whose sole existence is to seemingly answer all these questions through the power of a saucy, melodramatic cinematic adaptation of a Patricia Highsmith novel. The two real-life exes play a married couple who are equally hot and hateful, and spend a lot of time torturing each other and their New Orleans neighbors. Sparring around their precocious child, they insult each other with lascivious sighs and purrs that sound like threats.

Also there’s some light murder. I guess there’s water involved, too, though it is mostly in the form of drinking and is only occasionally deep.

For the most part, though, Deep Water has abandoned thought and logic for horny, unhinged vibes. It’s so much beautiful fun.

Deep Water will make you believe there’s someone out there for everyone. Hopefully your soul mate enjoys Deep Water.

The film drops its audience right in the middle of an odd domestic arrangement. Vic (Affleck) is a man who invented a microchip that’s integral to drone warfare; he’s become rich off of drone murders. He’s married to Melinda (de Armas), a terminally amorous woman who seemingly hates Vic. That’s not because she’s an ethical pacifist or concerned about the American government’s history of “accidental” civilian casualties, but because Vic is nice and boring.

How could a man who taught sky robots to murder better be boring, Melinda wonders constantly. How could a woman so randy be so mean, Vic wonders back. Divorce is an option neither one gives much mind to.

There’s no explanation of how these two found each other (College? A hotel bar? Hinge?) though the relationship is clearly off, thus creating a movie experience uncannily similar to sitting at a table next to a date that’s gone sideways. You pretend not to notice. You make eye contact with your own date. You both eavesdrop, but all you get are answers to questions that you still have to figure out yourself.

Vic and Mel have worked out a shaky arrangement in which Melinda is allowed to have side affairs with younger, ostensibly more exciting young men. (Melinda has forged a side deal with a faceless god who allows a steady trickle of very good-looking twunks into her life.) I’m not really sure what is in it for Vic, but the aerial death merchant seems to enjoy Melinda’s existence in his house. This setup eventually goes sour as Melinda escalates her affairs, hoping to get reactions out of Vic, and Vic gets angrier about how embarrassing those affairs are.

De Armas’s performance is dripping in hiss and slink. She breaks every word down to the syllable, then twists them in a way that seems both incredibly arousing and forbidding. She whispers alarm into phrases like “lobster bisque” and “mac and cheese” in a way that will now haunt me anytime I look at a New American menu.

Opposite de Armas, Affleck reprises Nick Dunne, the dense, airless husband he played in 2014’s Gone Girl. In that spectacular film, Nick, like Vic, also had a sociopathic wife who hated him. But her resentment was spurred on by Nick’s lack of ambition; he peaked too early in life. There’s much more menace and much less opacity with Vic, who presents as more of a loser than Nick ever did. Though Vic and Nick’s brow furrows and sighs come from the same Affleck, Vic’s originate from frustrated exasperation while Nick’s are more idiocy. Affleck is a guru of calibrating and finding the difference between.

Affleck and de Armas’s performances, bolstered with murders (plural!), twunks, snails (Vic has a snail garden), jazz, and unhinged bouts of resentful fellatio have created one of my favorite movies in recent memory. I can’t think of a sillier, sexier time on film. Deep Water is the movie you’ll want to text your friends about, and then invite them over to watch again, together, so you can witness their reactions when, say, de Armas pantomimes plucking one of Affleck’s stray pubic hairs out of her teeth.

Deep Water also functions as a cherished reminder of the infamous Affleck/de Armas real-life relationship , trapped eternally in amber. Both have since moved on — she’s playing Marilyn Monroe , and he reignited the couple known as Bennifer — but the psychosexual thriller was supposedly so powerful that it sparked a romance.

The two reportedly fell for each other when Deep Wate r was filmed in fall of 2019. They became a visible couple in March 2020, right before the pandemic shut down all social life in the US. Perhaps because of the lack of anyone doing anything and de Armas’s newfound stardom ( Knives Ou t was released in the fall of 2019), photographers spent a lot of time tracking Affleck and de Armas’s activities together. They took walks, drank Dunkin’ coffee together, took more walks, drank more coffee. They officially became the “It” couple of the pandemic quarantine. Their eventual breakup reinforced Affleck’s relatable everyman status, as he began to consume more coffee and order things off Amazon . In the same period, de Armas famously blocked the Ana de Armas Updates stan Twitter account that fervently supported the starlet.

What a fun and honestly embarrassing moment in time for anyone terminally online! Which many of us were, in those early pandemic days.

It was a time many things were taken from us — and for a brief stretch, it looked like we might not get this movie. It was delayed multiple times and then taken off the release schedule. It’s gone straight to Hulu, but it’s survived. We may never know how close we were to losing Deep Water forever! And thankfully, we never will.

Deep Water is currently streaming on Hulu.

Will you support Vox today?

We believe that everyone deserves to understand the world that they live in. That kind of knowledge helps create better citizens, neighbors, friends, parents, and stewards of this planet. Producing deeply researched, explanatory journalism takes resources. You can support this mission by making a financial gift to Vox today. Will you join us?

We accept credit card, Apple Pay, and Google Pay. You can also contribute via

Next Up In Culture

Sign up for the newsletter today, explained.

Understand the world with a daily explainer plus the most compelling stories of the day.

Thanks for signing up!

Check your inbox for a welcome email.

Oops. Something went wrong. Please enter a valid email and try again.

How JoJo Siwa’s “rebrand” got so messy

Student protests are testing US colleges’ commitment to free speech

Is Fallout a warning for our future? A global catastrophe risk expert weighs in.

Canada’s polite Trumpism

Mass graves at two hospitals are the latest horrors from Gaza

The wild past 24 hours of Trump legal news, explained

• Search Please fill out this field.
• Newsletters
• Sweepstakes
• Movie Reviews

Deep Water review: An un-erotic non-thriller that's still kinda watchable

Ana de Armas and Ben Affleck torment each other in a tale of fatal attractions, indecent proposals, and aggressive biking.

Can a snail be sexy? How about a bridge? These and other questions may tickle your fancy when you watch Deep Water , a ridiculous but involving drama streaming on Hulu this Friday. Patricia Highsmith's original novel about a murderous marital crisis came out in 1957. That's 65 years of evolving relationship dynamics to grapple with. And the film marks the first directorial effort in two decades from Adrian Lyne, famous for making the kind of glossy erotic thrillers nobody even tries anymore. Leads Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas coupled and decoupled during the years of release delay, so Deep Water arrives a triple throwback: an old story in a dead genre starring exes. It's also a goof, with an odd charm wildly at odds with the leaden melodrama. This train wreck gawks at itself.

Affleck and de Armas play the unhappily married Van Allens. Vic got rich designing some kind of drone warfare computer chip, and now his job is something something web apps and something something publishing. Mostly, he bikes around and takes care of their precocious daughter, Trixie (Grace Jenkins). Melinda stays busy getting busy. Her affairs with various hot young dudes are not subtle. At a party full of close friends, she makes out with handsome doofus Joel (Brendan C. Miller), who compliments Vic for being such a chill cuckold. Vic calmly mentions another "friend" of Melinda's who recently disappeared — and strongly implies that he did the disappearing.

Is Vic killing Melinda's boyfriends? Everyone assumes his confession is a joke. Melinda thinks he's too boring for that kind of excitement. Unfortunately, I agree. Deep Water takes Vic's perspective even as it keeps his actions mysterious, and Affleck never locates the jealous pulse to power all the spiraling tension. Melinda's accelerating promiscuity should torment him, but it mainly exists as gossip for their social circle. That includes local writer Don Wilson ( Tracy Letts ), who takes an interest in the murder rumors. Vic's best friends, played by Lil Rel Howery and Dash Mihok, are mostly there to stare wide-eyed at Melinda's dalliances and offer grim husbandly condolences.

Lil Rel Howery! Now we're getting to the good stuff. Affleck's morose blankness makes it hard to understand why anyone would be pals with Vic, and Howery's role could just be the Black Best Friend cliché. But his low-key comic energy pulls the torpid romantic plot in a more self-aware direction. He seems like a regular person who just wandered into a softcore noir; his double takes are quadruple. You get a similar vibe from the close attention paid to young Trixie, who keeps asking their Alexa to play "Old MacDonald" yet seems to have complete who-cares awareness of all the bad things her parents are up to.

Meanwhile, de Armas does all the acting Affleck doesn't. It's a sing-on-the-piano, third-base-on-the-dance-floor kind of performance. Melinda is said to be foreign (de Armas is Cuban), which a couple of characters hilariously pinpoint as an explanation for her flagrant actions. "America's so suffocating!" she declares, after Vic begs her not to drunkenly disrobe in front of their horrified babysitter. She openly taunts her husband with her affairs; at one point, she banishes him to story time with Trixie, so she can screw her latest boy toy downstairs. "If you were married to anyone else," she tells him later, "You'd be so f---ing bored you'd kill yourself."

Despite her brassy assurance, Deep Water obeys the most normative rules its genre, with de Armas showing off more skin than any of her paramours. Still, it lacks the sizzle of Lyne's earlier films. Do we laugh more at sex scenes now? Or are these sex scenes just funny? (Prepare yourself for the biting.) The silliness may also come from adapting Highsmith's tale into modern times. Melinda is supposed to feel trapped by Vic, but that doesn't read anymore. She mainly comes off as a charming sex-positive polygamist, until the film worrisomely ponders if all she really wants is attention. So there's a frustrating lack of specificity in the central relationship, which sucks the air out of any one-on-one scene between the couple. We're miles from Unfaithful , where Diane Lane and Richard Gere gave stunner performances while embodying equivalent strains of carnal desperation and adulterous suspicion.

That 2002 film is Lyne's masterwork, embedding all his gaudy stimulations in rueful yearning. By comparison, Deep Water stays shallow. There's plenty to gape at if you want a weekend rubberneck, and some eccentric flourishes of genuine personality. Vic has pet snails — and gang, this man really cares about his snails. All of Melinda's boyfriends are cast, accidentally or on purpose, to look exactly half Affleck's age and size. The New Orleans setting means that every house has an aspirational deck, and that a boozy-stoned pool party gets broken up by a tropical shower. The final act requires everyone to suddenly become 63% stupider, though there are sublime pleasures in the late plot turns. (Without spoiling anything, I'll just say that someone brings a cute puppy to a murder.) Deep Water isn't really thrilling or erotic, but it accomplishes a kind of diagonal camp sincerity, plummeting its glamorous characters into ever-tawdrier situations. I wouldn't marry it, but I wouldn't kill it. Remind me, what's the third option? C+

Related content:

• You can finally watch the trailer for Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas' erotic thriller Deep Water
• Ben Affleck, at the top of his game
• Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas' Deep Water pulled from theatrical release
• Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas end relationship

Related Articles

The Thriller Is Sexy Again in Ben Affleck’s Deep Water

The director Adrian Lyne’s first film in 20 years represents a comeback for the type of sultry, adult drama that used to pack theaters.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Ben Affleck, resplendent with stubble and weary eye bags, is a rich but bored husband with a beautiful (but also bored) wife, rattling around in a giant house wondering what to do with himself. Soon enough, a dead body appears. That’s the premise of Deep Water , a sultry new thriller starring Affleck and Ana de Armas as his wayward partner, but I could just as easily be describing Gone Girl , David Fincher’s superlative 2014 thriller about another Affleck-led relationship that goes sour. That tension is what the actor brings to the table these days: In any scene, you’re not sure whether you should kiss him or call the police.

Ever since the once–boyishly charming A-lister entered his 40s, he’s leaned into roles that emphasize a haunted past without sacrificing his marquee-friendly looks. Deep Water , directed by Adrian Lyne, is a healthy throwback to a previously dominant genre—the erotic drama. Lyne was once a master of the form, churning out hits such as Fatal Attraction , Indecent Proposal , and Unfaithful before seemingly retiring 20 years ago. His return plays to his strengths, stringing together tasteful sex and murder-mystery material to create a perfectly dependable two hours of grown-up fun.

Read: Ben Affleck gives the performance of his career

Because this is 2022, however, that grown-up fun has been relegated to a streaming service. ( Deep Water will debut on Hulu this Friday.) The film started shooting back in 2019, but its release was delayed time and again thanks to COVID; we’ve waited so long to see it, Affleck and de Armas even had an offscreen relationship that’s already run its course. Fox, Deep Water ’s original studio, has now been subsumed under Disney, and the family-friendly House of Mouse has decided to keep the adult story out of cinemas. (Disney has not commented on this decision.) That’s a sad fate for Deep Water , given that it represents a comeback for a type of movie that used to pack houses. ( Fatal Attraction was one of the biggest hits of 1987.)

Still, taking in all the steamy silliness from the comfort of your own home is enjoyable enough. In Deep Water , which is based on a 1957 Patricia Highsmith novel (itself a cited inspiration for Gone Girl ), Affleck plays Vic Van Allen, a retired microchip designer living in a fancy New Orleans mansion with his wife, Melinda (de Armas), and adorable daughter, Trixie (Grace Jenkins). Though the couple’s partnership is not without sexual spark, Melinda’s eye constantly wanders, and she fearlessly parades a series of men in front of her husband over the course of the film, canoodling with them at parties under his nose. Early in the movie, Vic takes Melinda’s latest squeeze aside and hints that he might have had a hand in the disappearance of her last supposed lover.

Is the comment a bit of jealous braggadocio, or is Vic actually a cold-blooded killer? That’s the keep-you-guessing appeal of Deep Water , which sees Vic and Melinda’s relationship vacillate between tenderness and simmering rage. In Highsmith’s novel, their marriage has entirely desiccated; Vic merely tolerates Melinda’s transgressions as long as she doesn’t ask for a messy divorce. But this update, written by Zach Helm and Sam Levinson, is a lot less clear on how officially “open” the couple are, and whether Melinda’s affairs are an attempt to catch her husband’s attention or push him away.

Affleck is therefore well cast; he can play Vic as a piece of dead weight while still winking at the movie-star magnetism that lurks underneath, teasing it out as the story develops. The role is far darker (and pulpier) than the one he played in the inspirational drama The Way Back , but whereas in that film he portrayed an alcoholic rediscovering his love of basketball, here his character’s true passion leads to a lot of suspicious disappearances. Once Vic makes his veiled threat to Melinda’s boy toy, he starts upping the menacing behavior around each subsequent lover (played by Jacob Elordi and Finn Wittrock, among others).

De Armas is one of the most exciting young stars around right now— her Knives Out performance was revelatory , and she was the best thing about No Time to Die last year. But she gets the short stick here, mostly glowering in the background as Melinda ponders whether Vic has turned as villainous as he’s intimating. Their scenes together have genuine sizzle, something many a modern Hollywood romance lacks. But Deep Water could use a little more shading for its female lead, especially some further explanation of just how her relationship with Vic deteriorated. Instead, audiences are served up multiple moments of Vic communing with snails, which he keeps as pets (a reference to Highsmith herself, who apparently once pulled gastropods out of her handbag at a dinner party).

Even in good whodunits, the setup is typically way more exciting than the payoff: For example, the first two-thirds of Unfaithful , Lyne’s previous film, are alluring and skillfully performed, while the final act feels more perfunctory. In Deep Water , viewers will have much more fun guessing at how dangerous Vic and Melinda’s cat-and-mouse game is going to get than watching the results unfold. Characters start making mistakes, the body count reaches implausible levels, and practical questions of just who is keeping an eye on Vic and Melinda’s daughter during all this mayhem start to overwhelm the narrative. But Deep Water is still a robust, well-acted thriller that lands most of its major twists gracefully; for that, all lesser sins can be forgiven.

• Skip to main content
• Keyboard shortcuts for audio player

Movie Reviews

'deep water' could have been artful or fun — but instead, it's just mechanical.

Linda Holmes

Melinda (Ana de Armas) and Vic (Ben Affleck) Claire Folger/ Courtesy of 20th Century Studio hide caption

Melinda (Ana de Armas) and Vic (Ben Affleck)

The word "trash" is a complicated one.

Pauline Kael wrote the essay "Trash, Art, and the Movies" in 1969. In it, she argued that many — that most — movies are not art. They are entertaining or not, they are pleasurable or not, they are satisfying or not, but most lack the level of technique that makes technique worth talking about, and thus, they are not art. She says that after all, people who are considering seeing a movie ask the question "What's it about?" or "Who's in it?", rather than the question "How [well] is it made?" But lack of technique doesn't necessarily make the movie bad, she argues. It's perfectly valid to like a movie, even while understanding it is not an artfully made movie. As such, Kael refers broadly to (at least some) movies that are not art as "trash," whether they are good or not. The term "trash" is not exactly derogatory, even though it is certainly dismissive of, specifically, the idea of treating trash as art.

So let's talk about Deep Water .

Deep Water is based on a Patricia Highsmith novel of the same name, although the liberties it takes with Highsmith's plot, characterizations, and themes are considerable. In the film, Vic (Ben Affleck) is married to Melinda (Ana de Armas), and they have a little daughter. Melinda has boyfriends on the side, a habit Vic knows about, and she knows he knows, and they talk about it pretty openly. This doesn't seem to be consensual nonmonogamy in the movie, or a kink they both enjoy; it's a situation that they both seem unhappy in, and it's not clear how they got here. (With that said, perhaps being miserable is their kink. I don't judge.)

The film comes from Adrian Lyne, who directed Flashdance in 1983 and then became sort of a king of semi-scandalous sex movies, including Fatal Attraction , Indecent Proposal , Unfaithful , and — probably most famously when it comes to sexual content — 9 1/2 Weeks . These movies were a fascinating example of the blurry lines between trash and art: Fatal Attraction is a sensational thriller that pushes an awful lot of pretty familiar exploitation buttons but managed to be nominated for best picture. And Deep Water is right up Lyne's alley: a story about the mixing of sex and violence, and particularly the explosive psychic dangers of extramarital affairs.

The writing pedigree here is peculiar: Lyne is working with screenwriters Sam Levinson, who created Euphoria , and Zach Helm, who wrote Stranger Than Fiction and Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium . That is, you might say, a lot.

Notably, Highsmith's explanation of the nature of Vic and Melinda's marriage is not the same as what you get from the movie. In the book, Vic sort of fancies himself a modern man, too sophisticated to be anything as petty as jealous or possessive: "One of Vic's firmest principles was that everybody—therefore, a wife—should be allowed to do as she pleased, provided no one else was hurt and that she fulfilled her main responsibilities, which were to manage a household and to take care of her offspring."

But in the movie, Vic doesn't seem to enjoy anything about his marriage; he glowers at Melinda at the (many) parties they attend as she openly dances and flirts with other men, and he stews as she comes home late over and over from various assignations. There certainly doesn't seem to be any expectation on his part that she participate in a traditional household. Admittedly, it can be hard to tell the difference between glowering angrily and glowering lustily, and I have already seen critical responses to this film that read Vic as more turned on by Melinda's affairs than I did. Is he grim or is he horny? That is the question.

The story kicks in when we learn that one of Melinda's past boyfriends has disappeared, and then something bad happens to another one of them, and the central question of the movie becomes: Did Vic have something to do with what happened to these guys? (Melinda immediately believes he did, which is another sign that perhaps this is not a consensually open marriage but something more troubled.)

From here, you get a lot of Ben Affleck wearing one expression. Even in the trailer , there is shot after shot of the same face of flat loathing. He's certainly presented as a potentially menacing figure in both the trailer and the movie, but what's missing is the specificity and the transformation of, say, Matt Damon's pale, awkward, grasping Tom turning inevitably monstrous in the Highsmith adaptation The Talented Mr. Ripley . Affleck here is just "angry jealous husband," largely the same at the beginning and the end, which is considerably less satisfying.

But it raises an interesting question that a lot of self-consciously steamy movies have raised before it: Is this good, even if it's not artful?

My conclusion is that it is competent , that Lyne certainly knows how to create the particular state of sweaty and potentially destructive lust that has become his signature. But it was hard for me to close the distance between myself and this movie, to get into it, simply because it felt ... mechanical. The seams show.

But there are times when Deep Water approaches another kind of success, which is the status of really good trash. This is particularly so in a sequence in which the great Tracy Letts, playing a local buttinsky, winds up as one of two characters in a chase scene on a mountain. You will see the extraordinarily unlikely, superhero-level, Fast-and-Furious -level feat of timing that is about to happen at the climax of this chase, and you will see that Letts is chewing, chewing, chewing the pretty mountain scenery to play it up. The guy knows what he's doing; he's over the top on purpose. He is participating in good trash.

There is also a strain of good trash in the fact that Vic — in a character flourish that is in the book — spends a lot of time out in a little shed communing with his collection of snails. The main purpose of the snail scenes seems to be that extreme close-ups of snails make them look kind of ... mucosal? And writhing? Which is sensual? All these question marks are to say that the snails almost seem to turn Vic on, which is a good-trash detail if ever there was one.

It's too simple to say this movie falls victim to being "no script, just vibes," but it's a little bit true. What's unmistakable here is the incredibly Lyne-ian mood , that '90s sense of the "seems to contain more sex than it actually does" picture. The Overton Sex Window has shifted considerably since Fatal Attraction , particularly given how much sex you can watch on self-consciously classy television, so there's something about the gauzy "fog of sex" tone they're going for here that's almost nostalgic. Erotic thrillers have a long and honorable history ( Fatal Attraction was part of the Michael Douglas drop-your-pants-and-run-for-your-life trilogy that also included Basic Instinct and Disclosure ), and long may they ... wave.

Deep Water Review

18 Mar 2022

On paper, Adrian Lyne looked like a safe bet when it came to choosing a director to bring an erotic, psychological thriller like Deep Water to life. Based on the Patricia Highsmith novel of the same name — about a husband and wife, the lovers she takes, and the fallout of a lie about murdering her last paramour — it is exactly the type of story that the filmmaker behind 9½ Weeks , Indecent Proposal and Lolita would be suited to. And yet, after a 20-year absence since the release of his last film, 2002’s Unfaithful , Lyne seems to have softened his edges.

The odd couple at the centre of this smalltown intrigue are Vic and Melinda Van Allen, played by Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas , who, after seven years together, have made a pretty iffy deal: she can have affairs with other men as long as she stays in the marriage for the sake of a daughter that only he seems to show much affection for.

That ‘Sad Affleck’ meme comes to mind every time the camera closes in on Vic’s face while watching his younger, dissatisfied wife flirt around with pretty boys at various locations: a neighbour’s garden here, another neighbour’s pool there, even their own dining room. De Armas certainly doesn’t endear Melinda to you, delivering her flagrant marital disregard with stunning viciousness and indifference to her husband’s feelings. But even though she shows motherly distance towards their child, Evelyn, the underlying pain and frustration in her wide eyes do evoke empathy for a woman who feels like a trophy wife and might have been pressured into parenthood too early.

Paparazzi photos of De Armas and Affleck from their brief relationship are believably hornier than most scenes. It is easily Lyne’s tamest erotic thriller.

Affleck, on the other hand, seems miscast as the sort of mild-mannered cuckold who, after teasing the idea that he murdered his wife’s ex-lover who disappeared, may just have developed his own dangerous, sociopathic impulses. Even when the narrative descends into entertaining ’90s-thriller levels of violent absurdity, Affleck is never convincing. He’s unfortunately not as charmingly disturbing as his pal Matt Damon in the title role of The Talented Mr Ripley — another of Highsmith’s psychopathic leading men — and as the movie hinges on this protagonist’s movements, it’s an underwhelming undertaking.

Deep Water couldn’t be further from the glossy, Mediterranean aesthetic of Anthony Minghella’s Ripley adaptation. Most of the action takes place in the expansive homes of a wealthy American community. That everything looks cold and clinical reinforces the Van Allens’ frosty and inhospitable marriage — as does composer Marco Beltrami’s melancholic strings in the score — but it also makes for a drab-looking film that reduces the potency of the sex scenes. They’re tempered further by erratic editing, especially in moments where imagination and reality collide. Paparazzi photos of De Armas and Affleck from their brief relationship are believably hornier than most scenes. It is easily Lyne’s tamest erotic thriller.

The script, co-written by Zach Helm ( Stranger Than Fiction ) and Sam Levinson ( Euphoria , Malcolm & Marie ) makes various changes from the original novel as a way to more obviously establish the potential for amorality in its male protagonist. An awkward garden party scene between Tracy Letts’ intrusive pulp-fiction writer Lionel and Vic, discussing the latter’s early retirement from selling a microchip for military use, is subtle but aptly lays the foundation for not only their antagonistic relationship but also for suspicion and paranoia to ferment. Yet the writers pull their punches by the final act, and never follow through with Highsmith’s shocking ending.

The Van Allens rarely function as more than stock characters in need of deeper introspection to warrant our attention, and it is really only through the sensual, kinetic performance of de Armas that any sense of passionate sentiment or nervous emotion is given life. The film is hindered by lacklustre direction and a script barely willing to scrape the surface of what could have been an intense, psychosexual exploration of masculinity, morality and marriage.

Log in or sign up for Rotten Tomatoes

Trouble logging in?

By continuing, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes.

Email not verified

Let's keep in touch.

Sign up for the Rotten Tomatoes newsletter to get weekly updates on:

• Upcoming Movies and TV shows
• Trivia & Rotten Tomatoes Podcast
• Media News + More

By clicking "Sign Me Up," you are agreeing to receive occasional emails and communications from Fandango Media (Fandango, Vudu, and Rotten Tomatoes) and consenting to Fandango's Privacy Policy and Terms and Policies . Please allow 10 business days for your account to reflect your preferences.

OK, got it!

Movies / TV

No results found.

• What's the Tomatometer®?
• Login/signup

Movies in theaters

• Opening this week
• Top box office
• Coming soon to theaters
• Certified fresh movies

Movies at home

• Fandango at Home
• Netflix streaming
• Prime Video
• Most popular streaming movies
• What to Watch New

Certified fresh picks

• Challengers Link to Challengers
• Abigail Link to Abigail
• Arcadian Link to Arcadian

New TV Tonight

• Dead Boy Detectives: Season 1
• The Jinx: Season 2
• The Big Door Prize: Season 2
• Knuckles: Season 1
• Them: Season 2
• Velma: Season 2
• Secrets of the Octopus: Season 1
• Thank You, Goodnight: The Bon Jovi Story: Season 1
• We're Here: Season 4

Most Popular TV on RT

• Baby Reindeer: Season 1
• Fallout: Season 1
• Shōgun: Season 1
• Under the Bridge: Season 1
• The Sympathizer: Season 1
• Ripley: Season 1
• 3 Body Problem: Season 1
• X-Men '97: Season 1
• Best TV Shows
• Most Popular TV
• TV & Streaming News

Certified fresh pick

• Baby Reindeer Link to Baby Reindeer
• All-Time Lists
• Binge Guide
• Comics on TV
• Five Favorite Films
• Video Interviews
• Weekend Box Office
• Weekly Ketchup
• What to Watch

DC Animated Movies In Order: How to Watch 54 Original and Universe Films

The Best TV Seasons Certified Fresh at 100%

What to Watch: In Theaters and On Streaming

Awards Tour

Poll: Most Anticipated Movies of May 2024

Poll: Most Anticipated TV and Streaming Shows of May 2024

• Trending on RT
• Challengers
• Play Movie Trivia

Where to Watch

Rent Deep Water on Prime Video, or buy it on Prime Video.

What to Know

Equal parts mystery and biography, Deep Water is both an engrossing documentary and an affecting treatise on human folly and obsession.

Audience Reviews

Cast & crew.

Louise Osmond

Jerry Rothwell

Tilda Swinton

Nina Kellgren

Cinematographer

More Like This

Movie news & guides, this movie is featured in the following articles., critics reviews.

Flickering Myth

Geek Culture | Movies, TV, Comic Books & Video Games

Movie Review – Deep Water (2022)

March 20, 2022 by Robert Kojder

Deep Water , 2022.

Directed by Adrian Lyne. Starring Ben Affleck, Ana de Armas, Tracy Letts, Rachel Blanchard, Dash Mihok, Lil Rel Howery, Jacob Elordi, Finn Wittrock, Kristen Connolly, Jade Fernandez, Damon Lipari, Michael Braun, Brendan Miller, Jaren Mitchell, Devyn A. Tyler, Jeff Pope, Paul Teal, and Michael Scialabba.

A well-to-do husband who allows his wife to have affairs in order to avoid a divorce becomes a prime suspect in the disappearance of her lovers.

Director Adrian Lyne essentially coming out of retirement (his last feature was 20 years ago) to adapt a Patricia Highsmith novel sounds like a match made in the lust circle of hell. Individually, they are responsible for some of the most renowned erotic thriller works for their respective mediums, whether it be Lyne’s Fatal Attraction or Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley (which was also brilliantly adapted starring Matt Damon in what is arguably still the best performance of his career), so even with an extended hiatus following a lackluster outing, there is plenty reason to be excited and feel that Deep Water could be the thrust in the ass that a largely sexless Hollywood cinematic landscape needs.

Somehow, it is somewhat of a disappointment in the sexual sizzle department, but there’s more than enough nefariously manipulative psychology going on in the minds of both of its immensely unlikable leads to remain invested. It’s also hard to place the blame on stars Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas (who ended up becoming a real-life couple for a brief stint) given that the script from Zach Helm and Euphoria ‘s Sam Levinson is at least 70% notes on how they should stare at one another with jealousy and inner pain.

Ben Affleck is tech genius Vic Van Allen, who also specializes in photography and an assortment of hobbies that are usually useful for stalking his wife Melinda (Ana de Armas). At first glance, Vic appears to be a chill husband that is comfortable with Melinda casually making out with other guy friends. He seems to allow her to have some level of polyamorous freedom, although it’s more because he has lost his passion for the marriage and only wants to stay together for their daughter. Even Vic’s friend (Lil Rel Howery) initially seems to be the troublemaker, encouraging him to reel Melinda in on behalf of her lustful behavior.

However, the sociopathic and narcissistic energy radiating from their characters offset this. I spent most of Deep Water hoping each one of them would fuck other characters to piss each other off more and that at some point, the child they mostly neglect and leave to a babysitter would get taken away.

Underneath that, Vic is a low-key psychopath that opportunistically chooses his moments to strike fear in Melinda’s friends by claiming to have murdered someone she was seeing when they were together. It doesn’t matter whether people believe him or not; it’s enough to make them cut contact with Melinda entirely and sometimes even flee the rural town. Sometimes this jealousy and unhinged behavior pull them back together for some short-lived intimacy, but for the most part, Melinda goes out and finds another guy to befriend.

As such, it’s like watching a twisted game of love/hate where the genuine fascination simply comes from how these characters/performers react to one another. At times, it feels like something Melinda enjoys not necessarily because it’s healthy, but because it’s the only way Vic shows some passion about being together. To their credit, Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas do have magnetizing toxic chemistry with one another.

Considering the revolving door situation of supporting characters, Deep Water consistently introduces new and familiar faces, typically with the unique skill set to quickly administer some personality before being kicked right back out of the narrative. Sometimes this can have a negative effect in that plenty of events are barreled right over and moved on from so that Vic and Melinda can get back to toying and trying to outsmart one another. However, the story remains grounded in the highly discomforting psyche of its central couple.

Melinda is not a saint and makes some troubling decisions, but what’s genuinely terrifying here is Vic’s public mask presenting himself to his friends as someone that encourages his wife to have romantic and sexual freedom, when he secretly has a disturbing amount of control issues. Wrapped up in all of this is a mystery novelist friend (Tracy Letts), who suspects that Vic is a dangerous person. And there is a sense of dangerous unpredictability within Ben Affleck’s performance as if he could violently snap at any moment.

Even as Deep Water shifts further into mystery territory itself, the narrative remains tethered to realism, by extension, keeping us on edge throughout. There’s always a curiosity of how any of what transpires will change the dynamic of their marriage or if it will at all.

Deep Water is a solid comeback for Adrian Lyne, even if the sexual energy it requires does feel slightly restrained, and the plot keeps moving forward beyond new developments as soon as they are brought up. It does at least build to a scorcher of an ending, culminating in a breathtaking chase sequence. Success mostly hangs on Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas believably psychologically going to war with one another, which they do with numerous stares and heated body language.

Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★  / Movie: ★ ★ ★

Robert Kojder is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and the Critics Choice Association. He is also the Flickering Myth Reviews Editor. Check  here  for new reviews, follow my  Twitter  or  Letterboxd , or email me at [email protected]

YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE:

The Passion of the Christ at 20: Mel Gibson’s Controversial Biblical Film Revisited

Underappreciated Action Stars Who Deserve More Love

Ten Essential Korean Cinema Gems

Ten Action Sequels The World Needs To See

The Essential Movies About Memory

Lifeforce: A Film Only Cannon Could Have Made

All This Has Happened Before: Remembering Battlestar Galactica

When Movie Artwork Was Great

The (00)7 Most Underrated James Bond Movies

Captain America: The Winter Soldier at 10 – An Unconventional, Hard-Hitting MCU Entry

• Comic Books
• Video Games
• Toys & Collectibles
• Articles and Opinions
• About Flickering Myth
• Write for Flickering Myth
• Advertise on Flickering Myth
• Terms of Use
• Privacy Policy

• Cast & crew

A group of international passengers en route from Los Angeles to Shanghai are forced to make an emergency landing in shark-infested waters. Now they must work together in hopes to overcome t... Read all A group of international passengers en route from Los Angeles to Shanghai are forced to make an emergency landing in shark-infested waters. Now they must work together in hopes to overcome the frenzy of sharks drawn to the wreckage. A group of international passengers en route from Los Angeles to Shanghai are forced to make an emergency landing in shark-infested waters. Now they must work together in hopes to overcome the frenzy of sharks drawn to the wreckage.

• Renny Harlin
• Pete Bridges
• Aaron Eckhart
• Angus Sampson
• Ben Kingsley

• Flight attendant

• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

More like this

• New Zealand
• United States
• Arclight Films
• Aristos Films
• Nostromo Pictures
• See more company credits at IMDbPro

Technical specs

Related news, contribute to this page.

• See more gaps
• Learn more about contributing

More to explore

Recently viewed