Remember BenAna? Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas got us through the first year of the pandemic. News of their romance broke right when COVID did in North America. They were in lockdown together and those shots of them getting coffee and walking the dogs sustained the celebrity industrial complex for weeks, if not longer.
Ben and Ana fell in love while working on Adrian Lyne’s Deep Water near the end of 2019. This film has been pushed back multiple times, and now it’s finally getting a release – March 18 on Hulu. BenAna is no more, but their brief time together will be immortalised on film. And the first look at the film, conveniently, has come out today, Valentine’s Day, because Hulu has dropped a trailer. Hulu is a TROLL!
If you know Adrian Lyne, you know the kinds of movies he makes. Adrian Lyne movies are dark and horny: 9 ½ Weeks, Fatal Attraction, Indecent Proposal, Unfaithful, just to name a few. This is a director who continues to explore the complicated territory between desire and cruelty. And it’s been a while, like 20 years, since his last effort. So there was some anticipation at one point for Deep Water, especially given the intrigue between its stars.
Now?
Well, I wonder if Ben and Ana would prefer to bury it. Which, I mean I get why, but it’s also a shame because there should be space for this kind of storytelling, for erotic thrillers, for sex – done respectfully and protectively, with intimacy coordinators and consent – at the movies. Popular movies have, over the last decade or more, have generally been de-sexed. Now we’re getting a film that seems to be promising sex, and drama and danger, but starring two people who were once involved in real life and have since moved on to other people, one of those people being none other than JENNIFER LOPEZ, lol.
The timing of this!
Like I said, Hulu is a troll.
But also… it’s a good trailer. They don’t give anything away, except that these two can’t wait to f-ck each other but part of their hot f-ck chemistry is based on some sinister provocation…
And how are they actually going to promote this over the next few weeks? You have to assume that promotion is part of the job. Typically, for a movie like this, a two-hander (that is not a euphemism for anything, you pervs), the actors junket together, paired for their interviews.
Will Ben and Ana be paired? While answering questions about their characters seducing each other, whatever sex games they might be playing, the motivation behind their characters’ f-ckery… literally? Sure. They’re professionals. Yes, of course, that’s the textbook answer. But it’s one thing to do it when you were only *just* colleagues while making the movie. It’s another when, well, you were more than colleagues. What is this press tour even going to look like? And the red carpet, if there is one? Will JLo be there? Happy Valentine’s Day!