Deep Water [Eaux Profondes] **** (1981, Isabelle Huppert, Jean-Louis Trintignant, Sandrine Kljajic, Éric Frey, Christian Benedetti) – Classic Movie Review 12,698

Deep Water [Eaux Profondes] is a deliciously deranged 1981 French psychological thriller with Isabelle Huppert and Jean-Louis Trintignant on tremendous, quite scary form as a loveless married couple playing a sick marital game on the island of Jersey. 

The 1981 film Deep Water [Eaux Profondes] is directed by Michel Deville with Isabelle Huppert and Jean-Louis Trintignant starring, and Sandrine Kljajic, Éric Frey, Christian Benedetti also in the cast. It is based on Patricia Highsmith’s extraordinary 1957 novel, her fifth to be published.

Deep Water [Eaux Profondes] is a deliciously deranged 1981 French psychological thriller with Isabelle Huppert and Jean-Louis Trintignant on tremendous, quite scary form as an eight-year loveless married couple, Mélanie and Vic, playing a sick marital game on the island of Jersey where they live.

[Spoiler alert] Vic and Melinda stay together under an arrangement where Mélanie can take any number of lovers as long as she does not abandon Vic and their daughter Marion (Sandrine Kljajic). Vic even seems to get quite friendly with some of the guys. Vic becomes fascinated with the unsolved murder of one of Mélanie’s former lovers and, to terrify her current fling, takes credit for the killing. You could say that it then becomes the story of how Vic regains Mélanie’s affections by killing two of her lovers, though this is a debatable interpretation.

A great score (Manuel de Falla) really whirls it along. Deville provides nuance, tension and style. Patricia Highsmith’s source novel, a study in psychosis, provides all the malice and hate. A couple of juicy murders apart, perhaps not really very much happens. But then it doesn’t need to. It’s all in the threat and menace. nice and claustrophobic, as well as people phobic. There’s not a nice. ‘normal’ character in sight. Trintignant does deranged and nutty brilliantly. It’s mainly his show. But then so does Huppert too, and she doesn’t let him have it all his own way, by no means.

The screenplay is by Christopher Frank (adaptation and dialogue), Michel Deville (adaptation) and Florence Delay (adaptation). It plays like a murder thriller version of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf. What’s that old film tagline? The family that slays together stays together.

It is remade as Deep Water (2022).

French film director and screenwriter Michel Deville died on 16 February 2023, at the age of 91. He is celebrated for Benjamin, La Lectrice [The Reader], Le Dossier 51, Deep Water [Eaux profondes] and Death in a French Garden.

The cast are Isabelle Huppert as Mélanie, Jean-Louis Trintignant as Vic, Sandrine Kljajic as their daughter Marion, Éric Frey as Denis Miller, Christian Benedetti as Carlo Canelli, Bruce Myers as Cameron, Bertrand Bonvoisin as Robert Carpentier, Jean-Luc Moreau as Joël, Robin Renucci as Ralph, Philippe Clévenot as Henri Valette, Martine Costes as La maman de Julie, Évelyne Didi as Evelyn Cowan, Jean-Michel Dupuis as Philip Cowan, Bernard Freyd as Havermal, Anne Head as La directrice, Maurice Jacquemont as Docteur Franklin, Sylvie Orcier as Jeanne Miller, and Pierre Vial as Le juge.

© Derek Winnert 2023 – Classic Movie Review 12,698

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