Unfaithful - Lifestyle News - NZ Herald
By PETER CALDER
(Herald Rating: * * * * )
Expat British commercials director Adrian Lyne must be exercised by the subject of infidelity.
This is, after all, his third film on the subject after the reactionary schlock of Fatal Attraction and the lame, turgid Indecent Proposal.
But this movie, loosely based on Claude Chabrol's 1969 thriller La Femme Infidele, which starred Michel Bouquet and Stephane Audran, is far more nuanced than either of the first two, thanks in large part to a compelling performance by Diane Lane.
She plays Connie Sumner, a middle-class mother living in affluent splendour in suburban New York with her husband Edward (Gere), who commutes to his business in the city, and their wide-eyed, slightly-too-cute son.
When, visiting Manhattan, Connie literally bumps into a bohemian bookdealing Frenchman Paul Martel (Olivier Martinez) and grazes her knee, he invites her up to his SoHo loft.
What ensues manages to be at once predictable and shocking. While the film is tainted by a whiff of the moralism which in Fatal Attraction was a putrid stench, it remains compelling because of Lane's effortless blend of stunned vulnerability and aching passion.
The film - and her part in particular - are driven by the knowledge that sexual betrayal need not come from explicit discontent (Edward is not unkind to Connie and there's no suggestion she is unhappy with her lot) but rather by a lust which borders on rage.
Nowhere is this more obvious than in the scene of the lovers' first meeting which is intercut with shots of Connie, her normal impeccability rumpled by love, on her way back home on the train. In her features, alternately contorted by pleasure and shock, we read her emotional life. It's a mesmerising piece of solo performance which creates a whole character before our eyes.
Sure, the film has its clunky bits: The apocalyptic windstorm on their meeting is a bit obvious and Martinez's smooth patter ("There ees no right and wrong; there ees only what you do and what you don't do") is too 70s for words.
But Gere as the wronged husband turns in a subtle performance devoid of false drama or self-regard and the film abounds in beautiful moments, observed in passing a taxi in the background, a cup of coffee guiltily declined when the word coffee has suddenly changed meaning, Connie switching off a light while Edward is still in the room.
Meanwhile, the script litters about the bitterest and most plausible of ironies - an answerphone message is a heartbreaker - and the ending is tantalisingly ambiguous.
Above all, we are always aware of how much Connie's actions are costing her and how compelled she is to pay up.
As romantic thrillers go, this is not quite a masterpiece, but for something from the middle of the mainstream it's a whole lot better than good. Peter Calder
Cast: Richard Gere, Diane Lane, Olivier Martinez
Director: Adrian Lyne
Running time: 122 mins
Rating: R16 (violence and sex scenes)
Screening: Village Hoyts, Berkeley cinemas from Thursday
