DEBORAH ROSS: A sordid affair in the four-part erotic thriller Obsession

Obsession

Judgement: **

Succession

Judgement: *****

Their eyes first cross the room at a boring drink. He’s William, a handsome, celebrated surgeon in his fifties, and she’s Anna, a political researcher in her thirties, and at that point all other considerations vanish. They have to have each other, even though she’s his son’s girlfriend, which is somehow a pretty big consideration. ‘What do you want to drink?’ he will ask her. “What do you want me to drink?” she will reply, as the steamy eye sex continues. I wanted to smash their heads together and send them home separately. But does anyone ever listen to me?

Their affair begins almost immediately in the light green, elegantly underfurnished London flat that Anna borrows from a friend (conveniently). For some reason the subtitles played along with the version I watched, so I can tell you that as soon as he took his jacket off and she was on the floor, they’re both ‘breathing heavily’ while ‘William inhales sharply’ and ‘ dramatic music plays’. ‘, and then ‘William growls loudly’ and ‘Anna gasps’ and a ‘siren wails in the distance’, and then ‘William gasps’ and also ‘screams’ while Anna ‘sighs shiveringly’.

This is the first of many encounters, and I bet the captioner was happy when this particular job was over. “I’m gasping for breath,” the captioner may have said, possibly “moaning softly.”

“It’s like watching a traffic accident, albeit one that ‘groans rhythmically’ as ‘exciting music builds'”

This is Obsession, the four-part erotic thriller based on Damage, the 1991 novel by Josephine Hart and made into a movie (1992) directed by Louis Malle and starring Jeremy Irons and Juliette Binoche. Here Richard Armitage and Charlie Murphy star, with a script from playwright Morgan Lloyd Malcolm, who says she wants to retell the story from Anna’s perspective, showing that there’s more to her than someone who comes into a family and it blows up and disappears. I don’t think it’s a spoiler to say that a family is blown up as it’s clear from the start that it will have disastrous consequences.

It’s like watching a traffic accident, albeit one that “groans rhythmically” as “exciting music builds.” Meanwhile, while only Binoche was ever shown undressed in the film, not Irons, this at least achieves parity in terms of nudity. That will please anyone who remembers Armitage as the romantic lead in the BBC’s North And South – my goodness, that was 2004, almost 20 years ago – and has been yearning to see more of him ever since. In this respect you will not be disappointed. Chances are you will be very happy.

At first, William seems to be living a wonderful life. He has a sexy lawyer’s wife (Indira Varma), a stately home in London, a father-in-law who owns a beautiful mansion, where they camp on the weekends, yet he seems to spend most of his time staring wistfully into the sky. the middle distance, as if that were his hobby. He has a daughter, Sally (Sonera Angel), who is so barely sketched we don’t need to bother with her, while his son Jay (Rish Shah) is a doctor-in-training who first appears in an old stunner but then seems to have access to limousines and expensive hotels, somewhat inexplicably. The other big mystery is why Anna is dating Jay since he is not only barely sketched, but is possibly the most boring and wooden dude to have ever lived.

What you have to believe in is the heat of it, the chemistry. You have to believe that William and Anna can’t help themselves, have no choice, have become so addicted that William even secretly follows Anna and Jay on a trip to Paris and has sobbing sex with a pillow in the hotel room they just visited. cleared (‘disturbing music intensifies’). It’s wrong to do what they’re doing, especially after Anna and Jay got engaged, but they can’t control it and we can’t look away—except that I could, and often did. I didn’t believe it and was a little embarrassed for everyone involved.

No character is fully written. William and Anna’s encounters are almost wordless, and when they speak it is in puzzling riddles. Willem: ‘What if he [Jay] find out the truth?’ Anna: ‘There are so many other truths.’ There’s a BDSM element, though its significance is never fully realized, and Anna is given a backstory that seems eerie rather than explanatory. The direction is also rather perfunctory. For example, when William isn’t staring wistfully at the middle distance, he’s staring at the clock, eager for the next assignment. I wish I could have banged them heads together from the start, and I say that with a sigh. In this case, however, it’s not a ‘shuddering’ or even a ‘groaning’. At least none of this stands out.

Outstanding: Sarah Snook on Season Four of Succession

We can’t let this week go by without mentioning episode three of the current series Succession, the biggest hour of television since, I don’t know. The screen went blank at the end of The Sopranos? I’m afraid to say more, in case you’ve been seriously living under a rock and planning to catch up, but want to say, yes, Sarah Snook deserves all the awards, as do Jeremy Strong and Kieran Culkin. But what about Alan Ruck, who plays Logan Roy’s oldest child, Connor, and is downright awesome?

Since Logan overlooked Connor and thought him a dumb fool, we tend to overlook Ruck, whose performance really gives the series heart and pathos. His speech last week about not needing love, because he was never loved, and this was his superpower, was intensely moving, as was his relationship with Willa (Justine Lupe). Introduced in series one as a sex worker who wrote the horrible plays that Connor financed, she was a bit of a joke, but their relationship, while still transactional, has somehow become tender and touchingly sincere too. I so hope they survive.