Adrian Lyne knows how to titillate. The English filmmaker has had American audiences in the palm of his hands since Jennifer Beals danced like no one was watching in 1983’s Flashdance. He’s given us the seminal affair cautionary tale in Fatal Attraction, and the shorthand for “X-rated” in 9 ½ Weeks. It should come as no surprise that Deep Water, Lyne’s first new film in 20 years, would be something of an event. If anyone can restore the horny energy at a time when erotic thrillers are all but extinct, it’s this guy—especially when he’s returning with a film that sparked one of Hollywood’s most recent tabloid obsessions.
Based on a 1957 novel with a script co-written by Euphoria provocateur Sam Levinson, Deep Water stars Ben Affleck as the gloriously named Vic Van Allen, a rich early retiree who doesn’t seem to mind that his wife Melinda, played by Ana de Armas, routinely cavorts with men half his age—sometimes literally right in front of him. Or does he? Reactions to the trailer immediately deemed it as a Cuck Thriller and spiritual sequel to Gone Girl—that other movie where Ben Affleck’s disdain for his wife is palpable enough for a community to believe it’s driven him to murder. The end result is something more complex, a tale that pits both Van Allens as equally complicit in the drama and mayhem that surrounds them. The film might not reach the same cultural heights as Flashdance or Fatal Attraction, but it’s all deeply weird and winkingly funny enough to sustain.
Ahead of Deep Water’s release, Lyne talked to GQ about returning to the silver screen, whether there’s room for eroticism in the mainstream anymore and the moment he saw sparks between Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas.
It’s been 20 years since your last feature.
Well, I did quite a lot. I spent a lot of time in France, and I was developing stuff, writing and working with writers. For whatever reason, they [all] didn’t work out. On one occasion it was a movie I really wanted to make, but didn’t think that they had a big enough budget to do what I wanted to do with it. In a way, I regret not doing it. But [the South of France] is a tough place to come back from. It’s a lovely place.
What was it about Deep Water that inspired you to get back in the saddle?
I love the novel. It feels a little bit parochial, because it was written in 1957. But it’s about a man who’s pissed off, because his wife is having affair after affair—but he’s not interested in her sexually at all, and so he takes refuge in their daughter Trixie, and in his snails. [Note: In the movie, Vic seeks refuge in a shed where he keeps hundreds of snails.] What I tried to do [for the adaptation], was to put in a complicity between Melinda and her husband, Vic, so that she’s not just [having affairs] for herself, but almost is doing it for him as well. Like at the beginning of the movie, when Vic looks through the window, and sees Melinda making out with Joel, she looks up and it’s like she knows he’ll be there. What’s interesting is that she doesn’t stop. She’s not embarrassed by it. She just continues, which speaks volumes for the relationship.
Comparing this to some of your other major films, this is probably the bleakest relationship you’ve ever depicted. At the core of the others, no matter how thorny it gets there’s an underlying sentimentality. But not here.
That’s true. In fact, Anna said many times during [production], They’re going to hate me. But that’s alright, I think. I mean, I hope that I achieved that this was a screwed up love story in the end. It was something that got hopelessly out of control. But I hope by the end that you sense that maybe this will continue, and she’ll kill him or he’ll kill her.
Even though this is based off of a novel from many decades ago, do you feel that the relationship as depicted on screen now is indicative of the current state of the world a little bit? Like we’ve moved past sentimentality in these kinds of films to a point?
Well, I thought it’s a risky film in that it’s not a conventional sentimental thing. I like being thrown into a relationship where you sense something’s wrong, where you don’t have it explained for you, but you learn. I quite like that early scene when Melinda’s getting dressed then she says, “well, what shoes?” Vic says, “the ones I got you in New York.” And then she says, “well, go get them.” I love the moment because his expression’s fabulous, it’s like, did you really say that to me? And you know she’s really a spoiled child, so he goes and gets them. Then suddenly she says, “do you know I love you?” So you got all of these different messages, which I think is fun, but you’re right, none of it is sentimental, and I like that.
What was it like working with Ana and Ben to develop this twisted relationship? It must have been fun to watch their chemistry build out of it.
What was good was that I saw it quite early when I tested her with Ben at my house in LA. To do it in the studio it would’ve been a bit antiseptic. So I had the bathroom to work in, I had the bedroom, I had a terrace, and it was fun to just watch the chemistry, watch him become fascinated by her. There was one scene where she was sitting on the edge of the bed: Melinda is pissed off at Vic, and she’s putting lotion on her legs or whatever. But during one take when [Ben] was watching her with me, he whispered to me and said, “I’m going in,” because he was off screen—meaning he wanted to be part of the scene, because he thought she was really good. And she was, she’s terrific in the scene.
So was it not surprising when they ended up embarking on a real relationship after filming this?
No, I wasn’t surprised, really. Right from the beginning, from that test, I sensed that chemistry between them.
When the trailer dropped, a lot of people said this reminded them of Gone Girl. What is it about Ben Affleck that makes him good at playing these repressed, dark husbands?
What I wanted him to be was broadly introverted and vulnerable, almost childlike. I wanted to avoid what I’d seen from him before, that sort of outgoing brilliant man that he does so well. I’m really proud of what he did because I think it’s different from what he’s done in the past. I think he is very vulnerable, and despite being a sociopath and a murderer he does make you feel for him, you know what I’m saying?
The first movie of yours I’d ever seen was Unfaithful, my parents were watching it when I was 12 or 13—
[laughs] You’re so young. Have you seen Fatal Attraction?
Oh yeah: that, 9 ½ Weeks, Indecent Proposal, all the hits. But I was thinking about Unfaithful while watching Deep Water because—Ben Affleck, Richard Gere, Michael Douglas—these guys play the heartthrob more often than not. Yet in your films, you set them up to be emasculated. Do you intentionally cast against type?
Oh, that’s interesting, I hadn’t thought about that. You’re right. You know, I tried—with not a great deal of success—but I tried to get Richard Gere to eat a lot, so that he’d be out of shape. I kept on leaving cookies and stuff in his trailer, and he ate them for a while, but then he understood what I was doing. What I quite like again, there’s sort of mixed signals that I like. For example, when Vic’s putting the lotion on her in the bedroom and he says, “I wish you’d choose somebody with brains.” He tries to be sort of urbane, like he can deal with it, and then within 30 seconds he’s trying to make out with her, and he gets turned down and has to seek refuge with his snails. It’s not a conventional movie, really; you’re swung backwards and forwards.
There’s a scene I like where they’re going home in the car, and Melinda finds a half-eaten apple that Trixie, their kid, left. And then when she takes a bite of it, she bites a chunk off for Vic. I like the intimacy of that, the fact that all of the family have eaten this apple, do you see what I’m saying? The apple brings them together.
We’re in a period of American where it’s often argued that eroticism in film seems to be on a decline. Do you agree?
Well, people say that stuff. I mean, I don’t really think too much about generalizations like that really. They always talk about eroticism like it’s a commodity or something. I think it’s just part of your relationship, part of my relationship. I’ve always liked movies that are about you or me, where the public can put their feet in the shoes of the actors and live a bizarre relationship through them, rather than their own. That’s what’s fun to me, really. I can appreciate Dune, or Matrix, or whatever, but I don’t particularly want to make them. I think it’s more fun when it’s close to home, and you’re seeing how much you can push people.
Is there a point, though, where it’s crazy to you to think that movies like Fatal Attraction or Flashdance were the biggest grossing hits of that year to nowadays, where it seems like the adult drama is being squeezed out of the mainstream?
I think it’s a pity, really. I mean, I would never now get the money I got—it wasn’t very expensive, but I wouldn’t get that sort of money to make Fatal Attraction now. I mean, I wouldn’t get it made [at all]], I’m sure I wouldn’t get it made.
I’ve seen you say elsewhere that it gets frustrating when the only takeaway from your films is the sex. What’s the takeaway that you’d rather viewers have?
I think the important thing is that they don’t forget it. The important thing is that they argue about it, disagree about it. I like making films where people disagree, because it creates discussion. For example, I did a film called Jacob’s Ladder. It’s the film I’m most proud of, I think. But it was a movie at the time when it came out, nobody understood a word of it. Now, it’s a movie that people talk about a lot, and there was a remake of it. It’s a movie actually that needed a couple of viewings to make you understand it, really. So, I love that. I like it when they haven’t forgotten your movie by dinner, and they’re still talking about it. They don’t have to agree, as long as it inspires discussion.
One filmmaker whose work I feel has a kinship with yours is Paul Verhoeven.
A lot of the films I like most were actually his European ones, his Dutch films. There’s a marvelous movie called Spetters, you should see that—funny title. I like his work. I like Paul Thomas Anderson a lot. I like this guy Sorrentino—Have you seen Hand of God? It’s the best movie of the year, really.
Jacob’s Ladder is the movie you’re most proud of, but is that your overall favorite movie of yours?
Yeah, maybe. I’m proud of this one, I have to say. I watched it a lot, and I don’t get tired of it. I like it because it’s complicated because you’re thrown around a little bit, I like it because it’s unusual.
Did this inspire you to ramp things up and make some more films soon?
Oh, yeah. I’ll have to do my next one a lot quicker than I did last time.