The Deep End

Rating:
Summary: Swinton Is Mesmerizing
Review: Released last year among wide critical acclaim, THE DEEP END opens with Margaret Hall confronting her teenage gay son's older lover, basically imploring him to stay away from him. As the plot progresses, someone ends up dead and Margaret is trying at all cost to shield her son from the possible consequences. Blackmail enters the picture when a man confronts the mother with an incriminating videotape of her son and the deceased, which he threatens to reveal if certain monetary demands aren't met. Tilda Swinton, in a usually thankless role, gives one of the most subtle, nuanced and Oscar-caliber performances of last year--despite the fact that she failed to score one. As the blackmailer, Goran Visnjic smoulders with red hot heat, but along the way also gives a pretty first-rate performance. Plot-wise, the film occasionally meanders at a slow pace, and the ending is a little lazy, but otherwise this stands as one of the
better made films to come out of 2001.

Rating:
Summary: Just Okay
Review: This film is beautifully photographed and very well acted by its lead, but -- spoiler alert, I'm going to talk about the plot now -- WHY did this seemingly intelligent woman choose to dump the body so close to shore rather than truly in "the deep end" of the lake where it might never be found? (I mean, Tilda Swinton could have at least found a handy kelp bed or something that might have disguised the submerged body a little better.)

The character of the handsome extortionist was rather thinly drawn, as well, but I don't agree with the reviewers who think the teenage son should have been more open about the whole affair with his mother to start with. Wake Up Call: talking about sexual matters with your parents at that age is very awkward, probably especially so when you're gay and they're straight. (Maybe this would have played better if the son had appeared to truly be 17 or so. The actor looked to be closer to 20...to me, anyway.)

I was glad to see a carefully crafted film, but the plot could have been more thoroughly worked out.

Rating:
Summary: A Taut Psycho-thriller with the Amazing Swinton
Review: Tilda Swinton has always had the power to amaze audiences by donning an ambiguous, almost generic presence in her films. She is neither man nor woman in "Orlando" for example, and here, in this new release she proves why critics around the world consider her one of the finest actresses in film today. Denied Oscar nominations for this and Orlando, the actress shines in an almost thankless role as a mother protecting her eldest son from a potentially disastrous situation that threatens his future. When she discovers his boyfriend's body on a beach near her home, she goes to work, burying the evidence and taking great personal risks to protect her child from harm's way. Soon, she is being blackmailed by the man's cronies and ends up in a game of cat and mouse that occassionally takes the breath away. The male lead - Goran Visnjic - is a sore spot in the movie, and one reason the film in the end isn't as effective as it might be otherwise. HIs con man, who ends up with feelings for his victim, is neither here nor there - and his poor command of English doesn't help matters. Sometimes, you find yourself wondering what he's said, while other times, it's so unimportant to the plot, you're wondering why something was written in the script in the first place. That serves ultiumately to derail the film but Swinton does her best mama-protecting-her-cub layered work here. Like "Orlando" this is an actress whose time has come and who must be recognized for the ambisexual textures she brings to every performance. Again, the actress was robbed of an Oscar nod for her work here, and after watching the "Deep End" one can only hope she continues to take risky roles so that a larger audience grows to appreciate the serene presence she brings to every character on screen. A wonderful performance in a less than wonderful film

Rating:
Summary: Beautiful and Haunting.
Review: I absolutely loved this movie! It has such a beautiful under-tone to it. On the surface of the movie we have themes like, betrayl, murder and deception, but on the "deep end" it had one theme: unconditional love. It really showed how selfless this mother was in regards to her children. She is willing to go to any lengths to protect them including disposing of her son's sleezy boyfriend's body after he accidentally falls off a dock and onto an anchor, after her son walks away from a cofrontation the two men had just had. The mom takes the body to a secluded part of the lake, without her son having a clue what has happened, and dumps the body.
The body is found by police and a man shows up at her door, requesting that she pay him $50,000 or else he turns over a video tape to the police showing her son and the dead boyfriend "in the act".
Anyways, I'm not going to give away the entire plot. But as messed up as things are on the surface for Margaret (Tilda Swimton), she is willing to do anything to keep her son in the clear, and making sure he has a good future.
I can't recommend this movie enough, it is really great. It will stay with you after it ends, and really make you think.

Rating:
Summary: Poetic, lush and breath-taking suspense drama
Review: A movie I loved so much that I actually stayed on my treadmill till it was over, extending my usual hour-long workout into 2 hours (and I'm paying the price today, ouch!)
From the opening scene to the last credit, you won't be able to tear your eyes from the screen. Tilda Swinton, the star and focus of this film, is perfect in the role of a woman trying to protect her family from tragedy while maintaining her daily routine.
A brief summary: Her adolescent son has been piecked up by a manipulative man and then the man tries to blackmail the boy's mother for money. Afterwards, he dies in cirucmstances that make the boy a possible suspect - although he is, in fact, innocent (I'm not giving anything away here; all of this is revealed early on in the movie).
Swinton is calmly focused (most of the time), single-mindedly determined in her quest to hold everything together in the face of nearly insurmountable odds. She is equally determined to make sure her family - son, 2 daughter, elderly father-in-law - aren't aware of what is going on, of the tragedy that took place within minutes of their front doorstep. Meanwhile, her life is changing but not in ways she could have foreseen. In spite of her best efforts, she can't control everything.
Watching Swinton juggle all her everyday duties (cooking, cleaning, keeping the kids organized and on time for school and after school activities) while dealing with the burden of hiding a body, covering up the evidence and keeping everyone in the dark, I couldn't help marveling at her apparent selflessness in the face of so much and at her incredible ability to fool those around her.
This movie is one of the best of the year. Don't be so swept up by the story,however, that you miss the visual details that are breath-takingly poetic in beauty and intensity. The lingering shots of Swinton's face, the color of the water, the way a drop falling from the kitchen faucet (framing a face in the drop) can punctuate the mood of the moment.

Rating:
Summary: Part poem, part domestic drama -COMPLETELY spell-binding
Review: From the opening scene to the last credit, you won't be able to tear your eyes from the screen. Tilda Swinton, the star and focus of this film, is perfect in the role of a woman trying to protect her family from tragedy while maintaining her daily routine.
A brief summary: Her adolescent son has been piecked up by a manipulative man and then the man tries to blackmail the boy's mother for money. Afterwards, he dies in cirucmstances that make the boy a possible suspect - although he is, in fact, innocent (I'm not giving anything away here; all of this is revealed early on in the movie).
Swinton is calmly focused (most of the time), single-mindedly determined in her quest to hold everything together in the face of nearly insurmountable odds. She is equally determined to make sure her family - son, 2 daughter, elderly father-in-law - aren't aware of what is going on, of the tragedy that took place within minutes of their front doorstep. Meanwhile, her life is changing but not in ways she could have foreseen. In spite of her best efforts, she can't control everything.
Watching Swinton juggle all her everyday duties (cooking, cleaning, keeping the kids organized and on time for school and after school activities) while dealing with the burden of hiding a body, covering up the evidence and keeping everyone in the dark, I couldn't help marveling at her apparent selflessness in the face of so much and at her incredible ability to fool those around her.
This movie is one of the best of the year. Don't be so swept up by the story,however, that you miss the visual details that are breath-takingly poetic in beauty and intensity. The lingering shots of Swinton's face, the color of the water, the way a drop falling from the kitchen faucet (framing a face in the drop) can punctuate the mood of the moment.

Rating:
Summary: The Impact of Subtlety
Review: Just as the dreamstate can produce high impact nightmares in a fraction of a second and have it all subsumed by the wakeful state, so does this powerful little low budget film impress far more than its packaging. The theatres are full of horror films and frenzied, noisy thrillers, but few have the impact that THE DEEP END holds. The undercurrents become more treasurable with repeated viewings. Tilda Swinton, always reliably fine and in a performance that deserved all kudos for 2001, captures the blind fear of a mother who would do anything for her beloved son, even shield him from what she feels to be a case of murder. A blackmailer (played with panache by Goran Visnjic) goes about his dirty work only to become involved in the plight of the victim. The interplay of these two characters is extraordinarily subtle acting which makes their developing relationship all the more credible. That such a series of nightmarish incidents could all emerge out of homophobia - both from the son in question and from the world in general - brings us to the breaking point of simultaneous fear and rage and some of the most sensitive parental caring that has appeared on film. Bravo to the writers/directors for sharing much of their behind the scenes experiences on this very well fleshed out DVD.

Rating:
Summary: Well-done modern film noir
Review: "The Deep End" is a great film noir thriller that's made even better by Tilda Swinton's amazing performance as a mother who does whatever is necessary to protect her son, despite the fact that he made have done a truly terrible thing. Co-directors Scott McGehee and David Siegel understand the power of melodrama and use it to full effect here. This is excellent adult entertainment.

Margaret [Swinton] discovers that her 17-year old son is having an affair with a much older man and tries to put a stop to it. She doesn't succeed. When she finds the man dead near the boathouse of the family's Lake Tahoe home, she assumes the worst and takes measures to assure that her son's promising future is not ruined. Everything she does, though, only causes her to go deeper and deeper into a world of homicide and blackmail. The audience is draw into the story because it knows things Margaret and other characters don't.

Of special note are the coldly beautiful cinematography by Giles Nuttgens and the haunting musical score by Peter Nashel. The script is a fine one. Sure, there are too many coincidences and improbable happenings, but these things occur in virtually all movie thrillers. Often, it's how they are handled that counts, and McGehee and Siegel handle them with finesse.

Rating:
Summary: good thriller
Review: "The deep end" is a film that really catches hitchcok's atmosphere. It's a story about a housewife, mother of three kids, who get involved with a crime and blackmail. Tilda Swinton plays the role of Margaret, who finds out her 17 year old boy is having a gay relationship with an older man. After an argument between Margaret's son and his lover, his body is found near the sea deck. Margaret has no choice and needs to protect her son getting rid of the body. A few days later, two men start blackmailing her, because of a tape which reveals Margaret's son having sex with his lover.

The great thing about this movie is that it reminds me of hitchcok's films. It's not so memorable like his movies, but really keeps hitchcoks tradition of showing a regular person, with a boring life getting involved with a crime scene and challenges she/he would never face. The affair between Margaret and the blackmailer makes the film more powerful, beacuse it's something that stays under the lines, though it moves the film and takes control of the characters action.

Rating:
Summary: Smouldering intensity, but few genuine thrills
Review: Despite its intricate plot developments and sophisticated surface gloss, "The Deep End" (2001) - co-written and directed by Scott McGehee and David Siegel as a belated follow-up to their well-received debut feature "Suture" (1993) - is more of a mood-piece than an outright thriller. Based on the novel 'The Blank Wall' by Elisabeth Sanxay Holding (filmed once before by Max Ophuls as "The Reckless Moment" [1949]), "The Deep End" updates an old-fashioned story for modern sensibilities: Tilda Swinton (longtime favorite of the late Derek Jarman) plays the devoted mother of 'sensitive' teen Jonathan Tucker ("Sleepers", "The Virgin Suicides") who's just broken up with abusive boyfriend Josh Lucas ("Alive", "The Hulk") following a violent quarrel. After discovering Lucas' corpse in front of their beautiful lakeside house - he had stumbled drunkenly and was fatally impaled after parting company with Tucker - Swinton assumes that he was murdered, and she moves the body to another location, hoping to conceal her son's involvement in the 'crime'. When the body is later recovered by police, she's confronted and blackmailed by a handsome stranger (Goran Visjnic, 'ER') who has evidence apparently linking Tucker to the victim...

In a Sundance Channel featurette which accompanies this DVD, McGehee and Siegel compare their work to the films of Douglas Sirk and Vincente Minnelli, most notably "Magnificent Obsession" (1954) and "Tea and Sympathy" (1956), but while "The Deep End" employs all the trappings of melodrama (multilayered story, clearly defined characters, corkscrew plot developments, etc.), it swaps the commercial artifice of those vintage potboilers for an altogether more subdued narrative style, allied to a range of intense, carefully modulated performances. Swinton anchors the film as a dedicated parent who pays a heavy price for loving her son too much, while Visnjic smoulders beautifully as a would-be villain forced to re-evaluate his moral position when confronted by Swinton's desperate reaction to his demands. Production-wise, the movie is near-flawless: Giles Nuttgens' widescreen photography makes a virtue of the glorious Lake Tahoe settings, and Peter Nashel's haunting theme music loans the film an appropriately solemn tone from the outset. Too slow for mass appeal, too clever to be dismissed, "The Deep End" is very much an acquired taste.

20th Century Fox's region 1 DVD runs 100m 48s and provides not only a beautifully-rendered print of the film itself - the gleaming Panavision images are reproduced in letterbox format (2.35:1), anamorphically enhanced, and there's a choice of 5.1 or 2.0 Dolby tracks, both as restrained as the movie itself - but also a crash course in low budget filmmaking. The directors' audio commentary reveals a wealth of 'invisible' artistic decisions which play a vital role in selling the drama on a purely psychological level, and the aforementioned featurette (24m 5s) covers a single sequence (one of the film's best, an acting showcase for Swinton) and the manner in which this pivotal moment was developed during rehearsal, all the way through to filming - fascinating, eye-opening stuff. English captions and subtitles are provided, along with a trailer which portrays the movie as some kind of Hitchcockian thriller...