Romantic drama based on the play by Terence Rattigan, starring Rachel Weisz and Tom Hiddleston. Hester Collyer, the wife of a high-court judge, embarks on a passionate affair with former RAF pilot Freddie Page. But with the scars of the Second World War still yet to heal, the all-consuming nature of the pair's liaison is set to prove destructive.
Admirers of playwright Terence Rattigan might be thrown by the first 20 minutes of this adaptation of his 1952 work, in which the suicidal Hester (Rachel Weisz) recalls her love life in a fragmented puzzle of images to the plaintive strains of Samuel Barber's Concerto for Violin and Orchestra. After that, however, this beautifully acted relationship drama reveals its more traditional aspects, with Weisz on stunning form as the middle-class wife who drops out of a loveless but dependable marriage, only to find that life with her new, much younger lover (Tom Hiddleston) isn't really enough for her, either. Somewhat revised from the play, The Deep Blue Sea is a heady and often heartrending study of lovers at loggerheads, and fans of director Terence Davies's earlier, more autobiographical films (Distant Voices, Still Lives, The Long Day Closes) will see his sure, steady signature in its gold-burnished visions of peeling paint, wartime bomb shelters and jaunty pub singalongs.
| role | name |
|---|---|
| Hester Collyer | Rachel Weisz |
| Freddie Page | Tom Hiddleston |
| Sir William Collyer | Simon Russell Beale |
| Mrs Elton | Ann Mitchell |
| Philip Welch | Jolyon Coy |
| Mr Miller | Karl Johnson (2) |
| Jackie Jackson | Harry Hadden-Paton |
| Liz Jackson | Sarah Kants |
| role | name |
|---|---|
| Director | Terence Davies |
