Neil Jordan’s The End of the Affair, a 1999 remake of a 1955 film I will not be seeing, and based on a 1951 Graham Greene novel I wouldn’t bother reading if I were locked inside Supermax with it and it alone, is, I’m guessing, the first and only movie ever made that makes the dull, predictable, unimaginative sex of a long marriage infinitely preferable to the extra-marital variety. As experienced by Maurice (Ralph Fiennes) and Sarah (Julianne Moore), the hot, spontaneous coitus of adultery has been replaced by a tedium so infinite, so soul-crushing, that were this movie sent to alien races far, far away, they would at last understand why and how the human race engaged in collective suicide. If this is what this pair is escaping to, imagine, then, what they are escaping from. Nightly beatings? Unending torture? Bones broken, eyes gouged, jaws shattered, re-set, and shattered again?
And yet, what we see of Sarah’s marriage is, by anyone’s standards, quite typical. Her hubby is well-meaning, but dull, and there’s at least some evidence he’s either gay or impotent. Even with all that, and further combined with the temperament of Ted Bundy and the hot breath of Richard Ramirez, it’s still no explanation as to why she chose – as the real love of her life (a point she makes a good 33 times in the course of the film) – this man so lacking in color, so inexpressive and dull, it’s impossible to imagine he’d ever have the energy to sustain even a modest erection. For nary a second do we witness his sexual prowess, and instead of seduction, he spends most of their time together saying he’s jealous of everything not nailed down. For example, he hates the rain. Don’t we all, but he seems to have made his resentment a singular topic of conversation. Which is every conversation, since it rains for 95% of the movie. He also hates her buttons, as they get to spend all day with her, while he only gets her in fits and starts. As such, he whines, complains, mopes, and sighs, and that’s while getting a blowjob. He’d kiss her, but that means he’d have to stop bitching.
Maurice is, for my money, the most hateful character I’ve ever encountered, and since the film takes place during WWII, I kept hoping he’d be shipped off to the front, but only if we got to see a mortar shell find its way to his face. Fortunately, he is injured in an explosion during an especially heavy night of the London Blitz, but he recovers so quickly and completely that we roar in disgust at the blown opportunity. More to the point, why on earth were they fucking while the bombs were falling? Oh yeah, because if there’s a more self-involved entity on earth than a man and woman infatuated with each other, I’ve yet to find it. Never mind that Maurice made a move on his friend’s wife within 90 seconds of meeting her. And never mind that each declares an undying love well before they exchange anything of meaning. I’d say their passions drove the bus, but as stated, what we get to see – we, the poor audience – is far and away the most asinine sex ever filmed. I was so bored I even waved away Moore’s heaving bosom as if it were a swarm of mosquitos.
Okay, so we limp along, hoping for something, anything that will prove old Neil once again has a trick up his sleeve. Because yes, we’ve all seen The Crying Game. Was Maurice a woman? Sarah a secret Nazi spy with a direct line to Hitler? Maybe she was Hitler. Lots of nutty options to save this unholy mess, yet our man Jordan goes with the oldest and dumbest turn of all; so old and dumb that even cheap melodramas stopped going there for fear of being dismissed as too unbelievable. Yes, Sarah has a cough. A nasty cough. A cough that saps her strength but keeps her pink and luminous right up until the moment she expires. We are never told what exactly kills her, but it doesn’t matter, as her death is a rare opportunity to see a bit of fire in old Maurice. Because this angel on earth has been taken, Maurice now hates God. His rage is the one and only time the film springs to life, because any scene where someone rails against a sadistic deity is a moment I will applaud, regardless of the claptrap that surrounds it. If only the previous 100 minutes had been so fearless and wise. Given this, why on earth didn’t Jordan toss the original script and give us two hours of our naked lovers screeching about the Almighty? At least then I’d have understood the hard-on. Not his, mine.
To further insult our intelligence, the film incorporates a private eye (Mr. Parkis), who has the annoying tendency to show up every now and again to comment on the action. And did I mention he was hired by Maurice to follow – wait for it – himself? Is he mad? A turnabout voyeur? The result of a dimwitted screenplay with gaping holes of illogic? Yes to all, I’m afraid, though Parkis does track other lovers because, naturally, Sarah is a bit of a whore. She even bangs a priest. And because the film is the polar opposite of fun, it closes the door on their fucking instead of showing us the instinctive perversions held by all men of the cloth. Let’s see the padre dressed as a nun, getting pistol-whipped while screaming in German. Maybe he likes to wear a diaper while being read chapters from Leviticus. Anything but cutting away to the dreary affair between Sarah and Maurice. By my count, there are at least four bedroom displays, including one where the clothes all but stay on, and not once was any of it distinguishable from a nap.
So yes, Julianne Moore was nominated for Best Actress, which is, against all logic, an even greater crime than her later win for the Lifetime nonsense of Still Alice. She’s breathless and attractive, yes, but so utterly inconsequential that she’s arguably more impactful as a corpse. Not once does she offer any insight into the human condition, and even less into the assumed point of all this – amour. The first rule of relationships – and I’m in no position to lecture anyone – is that if you’re talking about your affair more than actually living it, there’s a major problem afoot. Especially if your point is to enlighten and entertain. But if you’re going to talk – and talk – come to the point quickly, and return to pounding ass. Show some life, goddammit. And please, while we’re engaged in a World Fucking War, show a bit of restraint and head to the bunker. You can fuck in there if it’s just something you must do. But look around you now and again. There’s a whole world out there waiting to be discovered, with folks far more interesting than you. If only Neil Jordan had filmed that.
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