This film is recommended.

Based on Terence Rattigan's 1952 play, The Deep Blue Sea is stylish soap opera at its best, and an overly ripe melodramatic downer at its worst. The film is reminiscent of the type of films that were popular fare in the fifties. ( And please, don't confuse it with the similarly titled shark attack movie some years back. ) No blood is spilled in this movie adaptation, but many lives are destroyed as loss and suffering does take its toll.

It is post-war Britain. Ruins are everywhere, from the bombed-out buildings to the people who inhabit them. There is a drabness in their hopeless lives, their colorless clothes, and their everyday routines. One such person is Hester Collyer, an unhappy romantic soul, trapped in a comfortable but loveless marriage to Sir William, a wealthy judge. Of course this means only one thing: suicide or an affair is in the offing. Fortunately ( or unfortunately, as the case may be ) after she meets a dashing but lonely RAF pilot named Freddie, there is a temporary respite from her real world. Lust, sin, and passion become the missing strands to her unraveling world ( which is not too surprising when one sees Hester's blatant scarlet red coat that overtly signals a Prynne moment is upon us. No subtlety lost here. Code Red, or is that Coat Read? )

This period melodrama is terribly British with a capital B. All proper diction, words unsaid, and formal reserve. Everyone is so noble and refined. Writer / director Terence Davies evokes the right atmospheric mood as we become lost in Hester's memories. He has a fine visual eye for those bittersweet times and Davies sensitively recalls the aftermath of WWII most efficiently with his use of popular and classical music and strong imagery, especially the impressive Underground bomb shelter scene. After an overly slow beginning, the director paces his film quite well using sounds, silences, and pauses in the characters' reactions to their conversations most effectively in telling his tale of a love undone.

The film sporadically uses these moments to tell the story of the makings of a passionate love affair, but its fragmented structure never allows us to understand Hester's attraction and her rationale to her self-proclaimed changes in her life. She's portrayed as a sympathetic victim, yet this character chooses the very unhappy lifestyle that she now wallows in, and we moviegoers are unable to see the results of her actions. It's as if some parts to her past are missing and sketchy, especially the happier times.

As the damaged Hester, Rachel Weisz is quite smashing. This talented actress fills her slightly underdeveloped role with such clarity and depth. ( Her scene in the pub as she stares into her lover's eyes while becoming uninvolved with the rowdy goings-on during the sing- along of a Jo Stafford tune says more than mere words could have expressed. ) It is a powerful nuanced performance. Completing the love triangle is Simon Russell Beale as her concerned husband and Tom Hiddleston as her cad of a lover. Both actors create indelible contrasting personalities, although the character of Freddie comes off the worst of the pair. Solid support from Ann Mitchell as Hester's landlady and Barbara Jefford is Hester's judgmental mother-in-law round out this wonderful ensemble.

The Deep Blue Sea is a successful throwback to the the great David Lean film, Brief Encounter. Only this time, the encounter is not brief and fleeting, just fleeting. It takes the moviegoer back to a former time, unlike today, when movies had a heart and mind, and dare I say, soul. GRADE: B

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It's London around 1950. Hester Collyer (Rachel Weisz) is the sad wife to judge Sir William Collyer (Simon Russell Beale) in a loveless marriage. She is in love with British Air Force pilot Freddie Page (Tom Hiddleston). William won't consent to a divorce and makes it difficult for the couple. She is so distraught that she tries to kill herself.

I don't like depressed people on film. Basically, it's depressing to see depressed people. As a romance, this movie has no build up. They are having the affair right from the start. In fact, they're naked and in bed before the 10 minute mark. The movie is done in a lot flashbacks. Basically she's trying to kill herself before she's earned that right. I can't really feel for anybody in this movie. The romance is just thrown at us without any introduction. The movie is showing the pain and the ecstasy before it even shows the love. The disjointed and jumbled nature of the narrative really screws this up for me. I don't buy their love because I don't see them falling in love. I don't buy their pain because I don't see their love. I don't buy her depression because I don't see their pain. Basically I got emotional whiplash. A melodrama romance is often too slow and deliberate for me anyways. This one basically double down on that and it tired me out. It has such big emotions before I even bought into the love affair.

Not to be confused with the shark thriller with Saffron Burrows, Ice Cube and Samuel L. Jackson, I know this was a British made film, and the leading actress in it, but I didn't know anything about the plot or concept, so I was looking forward to it. Basically, set in around the 1950's, Hester Collyer (Golden Globe nominated Rachel Weisz) is a young woman married to the older High Court judge Sir William Collyer (Simon Russell Beale),and is having a passionate affair with handsome young former RAP pilot Freddie Page (Thor's Tom Hiddleston) who is still haunted by memories of the war, and he almost feels no fear and excitement in life anymore. Most of the story takes place in the space of one day, when in her flat Hester attempts to commit suicide, she fails to do so and recovers, both the affectionate but no-sexual affair and the constrained but comfortable marriage are played out together through flashbacks. Her affair is discovered, and leaves her regular life of relative luxury for a dingy life in a small London flat with her lover, he has awakened her sexually, but despite his thrill-seeking ways he cannot give her the same love and stability as her husband, but she cannot return to a life with passion, so there is a lot of dilemma. Also starring EastEnders' Ann Mitchell as Mrs. Elton, Jolyon Coy as Philip Welch, Karl Johnson as Mr. Miller, Harry Hadden-Paton as Jackie Jackson and Sarah Kants as Liz Jackson. Firsty, the title is derived from the lead female character's dilemma of being caught between the Devil and the deep blue sea – two equally undesirable situations, I think I know what that means, going with your conscience or going with your heart. Reisz gives a good performance as the woman caught between choosing her acceptable home life or having a bit more excitement with a new man, Hiddleston is also good as the man she embarks on an affair with, the story is relatively simple, based on a stage play, full of strain and heartrending material, it is well acted and produced, and certainly keeps you wondering where is is going, a terrific drama. Very good!