THE DEEP BLUE SEA

The best way to describe this 2011 adaptation of a Terence Rattigan play is 'exquisitely bleak'. It was a rare pleasure to experience a film so masterly in its execution.

Everyone involved should have got every accolade going, but of course they didn't.  

I get that the deeply moving music wasn't eligible for an Oscar nomination given that it is a violin concerto by Samuel Barber.

But what about, for example, Florian Hoffmeister (who later got an Oscar nomination for Best Cinematography for his work on Tár)?  Every frame here is beautifully composed and shot. 

Or Rachel Weisz, who gives a phenomenal lead performance as Hester, a woman driven near to suicide by her somewhat unrequited love for an ex-RAF pilot (Tom Hiddlestone)?  At least the New York Film Critics had the good sense to give her the best actress award.

I can always happily watch Simon Russell Beale, and needless to say his performance as Hester's husband is note perfect, and the expression on his face as he leaves her, knowing she is lost to him for good, is heart-wrenching. 

The director Terence Davies also was overlooked by the Academy which was par for the course for him, I guess he wasn't a showy enough director to attract their attention.

Finally, one has to give credit to Rattigan.  I had thought of him (for no good reason) as a merely solid and conventional playwright, but this play seems surprisingly modern, both in its time-jumping structure and in its theme of sexual infatuation. 

RATING: ✓✓✓ Absolutely Fabulous