Deep Water

Deep Water (2022)

Runtime: 115 minutes

Directed by: Adrian Lyne

Starring: Ben Affleck, Ana de Armas, Tracy Letts, Dash Mihok, Lil Red Howery, Grace Jenkins

From: Hulu

I along with others wanted a return of the 80’s/90’s erotic thriller, but not like this. When I signed up for Disney+, it was bundled w/ Hulu, meaning both platforms can be used, along with the Hulu titles that are also on Disney+. Those not in the United States, that was the platform it was put on here instead of Prime. Hilariously, I watched this adult trash on Disney+ because it was the stream that was in 4K instead of 1080p.

This was a mystery/thriller where Ben Affleck (Vic) and Ana de Armas (Melinda) are a married couple w/ a 6 year old daughter but the relationship is irrevocably broken so Vic allows Melinda to cheat on him with various young men. Various people have open relationships and some even like being cuckolds; as this was based on a 50’s novel by Patricia Highsmith, this is none of that. Is it Vic that is murdering her lovers? If I was married to Miranda the character, then probably not due to her behavior. If I was married to Ana de Armas, on the other hand… besides having one of Letterboxd’s queens, it has one of its princes in Finn Wittrock and its current king, Jacob Elordi.

Throughout the first act, I was wondering where the sexy moments exactly were? Setting up the story is important but aside from Armas getting her boobs out-which I knew of long ago-and me having various laughs (both intentional and not so much so), the opening 35 or so minutes were odd, filled w/ awkward moments. I’d seen some gifs in the past of the raunchiest moments involving Armas so I knew it was coming… so to speak. After that, the vulgar moments began, but unfortunately “flaccid” is a great word to describe the film as a whole. Affleck’s typical facial expression wasn’t quite like that meme but it was still rather blank in his role as a cuck who constantly bikes and raises SNAILS for some reason.

Once I realized what was going on with the plot, did I ever lose interest at this picture that just became increasingly lame and boring the further it dredged on. Somehow, this originally was going to be like 40 (!) minutes longer; that is insane as it felt overlong hovering just below two hours. To get down to brass tacks, this wasn’t very erotic nor was it all that thrilling; aside from some flashes of good material, familiar faces in the cast, a soundtrack that had some old bangers, and a child performance from Grace Jenkins that wasn’t bad… this was just passionless, lacking in any flavor until a pathetic conclusion where the movie abruptly halts rather than ends properly.

Stick with the real erotic thrillers of the past; mainstream stuff like Body Heat or more obscure like Dream Lover are a lot more fun than Deep Water. Heck, director Adrian Lyne (returning for the first time in 20 years) did it better himself with Fatal Attraction and 9 ½ Weeks.