Worth: $12.00
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Gina McKee, Rupert Everett, Harry Styles, David Dawson, Emma Corrin, Linus Roache
Intro:
… a passionless affair …
It’s a grey day in a sleepy seaside town as Patrick (Rupert Everett), suffering the ill effects of a recent stroke, is moved into the study of his friend’s home. Marion (Gina McKee), ever the bookish schoolteacher, has done her research on how to care for Patrick. She’s read the books, she’s readied the study with an accessible bed for his arrival, she is prepared for everything. Her husband Tom (Linus Roache), on the other hand, is not.
This slow and simmering build up continues apace as the film progresses, complete with brooding shots of the beach and various people staring pensively out of windows as the history behind this odd triangle unfolds.
Flashing back to 1950s Brighton, we’re reintroduced to Tom and Marion (Harry Styles and Emma Corrin) in their youth, at the very beginning of their plodding, traditional courtship. Tom teaches Marion to swim, she recommends her favourite books to him… Tom escorts Marion to the art museum at the personal invitation of the curator, a man he met on his job as the titular policeman, during a time when blue police boxes were still used for their intended purpose.
Enter Patrick (David Dawson), the alluring third wheel who proves a little too captivating to our seemingly conventional twosome. He’s charismatic and charming, Dawson’s intensity providing the perfect counterweight to Styles’ own ingénue performance. What follows is a romance that trudges along obligingly, much like walking through a thick fog.
Much of what we see is through Marion’s eyes; she should be a compelling figure, or at least a relatable one, suffering the consequences of a bigoted society in her own way alongside Patrick and Tom. Her constant overstepping of boundaries, however, feels uncomfortably invasive. Instinctively possessive of Tom, she helps herself to Patrick’s old diaries as he lies bedridden in the next room—not exactly endearing behaviour.
With stage director Michael Grandage at the helm, this adaptation of the Bethane Roberts novel is a mixed tale of romantic longing and emotional obstruction, more a commentary on the harm caused by compulsory heterosexuality than a love story in and of itself. Overall, there are some solid performances, but just as Marion complains that her marriage to Tom has been a passionless affair, the same could unfortunately be said for the majority of the film itself.
