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Leaving the small midtown Manhattan screening room after seeing Terence Davies' new film The Deep Blue Sea this little scene played out:

Me: You know, I kinda liked that movie.
My Wife: Yeah? It was. . .I dunno. . .
Me: It was what?
My Wife: Well, were we supposed to take that seriously?
Me: Um, well. . .yeah, but, you know, it's something of an old movie.
My Wife: It hasn't even come out yet!

End scene.

But it's a good point. The Deep Blue Sea was so evocative of doomed British romance films of the WWII era that here I was making excuses for its dated qualities. (And the truth of the matter is that David Lean's Brief Encounter and Edward Dmytryk's The End of the Affair are far superior films anyway.)

Yet I stand by my gut reaction: I kinda like this movie. Despite its overblown musical cues (oy! those shrill violins!) and histrionic lead performance, there were more than a few moments when I nodded and thought "yes!"

The Deep Blue Sea is based, as you literate folk already know, on a well-regarded play by Terence Rattigan. It (and its star, Peggy Ashcroft) were quite the vanguard on the British stage back in 1952 with this portrayal of a suicidal adulterer. Davies' film makes a few attempts to open up the action, but even the scenes in pubs, or the street, or a flashback to a bomb shelter tube station have a deliberate, stagey quality. All eyes are on the acting, all ears on the dialogue.

The dialogue is sterling, in that way that only thoughtful British theatrespeak can be. A character rattles off a mouthful of SAT words and then, after a pause, you realize, “hey! I think she's talking about boning!”

Forgive me for being so coarse, but the physical act of love (and its oftentimes eventual partner-in-crime, emotional love) is, indeed, at the heart of The Deep Blue Sea. Our lead, the quite lovely and just a teeny bit zaftigRachel Weisz, strays in her marriage from Lord Soporific Van Frumpyfrump and ends up shacking up with the very handsome Tom Hiddleston.

Hiddleston, reminiscent of a young Ralph Fiennes here, is already trapped reliving his war heroics even though peace has just been declared. He and Weisz dance in an oak colored pub and the camera swirls around them in a tangle of sheets (not too much skin, please, there's no reason to be vulgar) but he's upfront about his unwillingness to commit. Weisz leaves the safety of her marriage, but her wealthy husband denies her a divorce. (It is unclear if this means she also has access to his dough: if this is the case, well, it ain't such a bad deal.)

The adulterers live together in a modest apartment, but Hiddleston's seasonal passion is enough to drive Weisz batty. There are no implications that he is two-timing her, but the fact that he isn't willing to set himself on fire for her is enough for her to turn the gas pipes on high.

What excited me about this movie, other than seeing Rachel Weisz in such smart dresses, is the notion of a woman being so unprepped by her culture to experience anything resembling passion. Maybe the prurient aspects are so sublimated that I just couldn't pick up on them, but for me the essence of the story is society telling Weisz's character that her desires are irrelevant, and she fighting back.

But you have to wade through a lot of crying to get there. The Deep Blue Sea is definitely not a film for everyone. It is slow, it is quiet (when the over-the-top Samuel Barber music isn't blasting) and it is subtle. It would be easy to wave this movie off with a shrug or a polite comment about it being more relevant in the 1950s, but considering the absurdity of “women's issues” in the 2012 election cycle, I'm willing to accept it as a lot more timely than you might think.