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Film Search
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The Aftermath
Historical drama, Romance
Rachael Morgan (Keira Knightley) arrives in war-ravaged Hamburg in 1946 to join her occupying British army officer husband (Jason Clarke); they will be living in the stately manor of architect Stefan Lubert (Alexander Skarsgård). The house is fetishized by the film in precisely the same way that the suffering of survivors in the city is all but ignored; the postwar upheaval is nothing but a cheap backdrop to two beautiful people getting it on. That’s right: It’s not even a matter of suspense that the movie is just waiting to get to sexytimes between Rachael and Stefan—yet their putatively illicit affair is disappointingly unerotic. The film disappoints even as pure melodrama. Rachael is a very passive character, more pushed around by others, and by events, than a woman who must make a choice—between the husband who isn’t a bad guy but from whom she has become estranged over the long course of the war, and the exotic and socially dangerous new lover. A legit romantic, tragic movie about Knightley and Skarsgård enjoying steamy unapproved bedplay would be very welcome. This ain’t it.
Official Site: www.foxsearchlight.com/theaftermath
Director: James Kent
Producer: Jack Arbuthnott, Malte Grunert, Ridley Scott, Carlo Dusi, Beth Pattinson and Joe Oppenheimer
Cast: Keira Knightley, Alexander Skarsgård, Jason Clarke, Martin Compston, Flora Thiemann, Kate Phillips, Jannik Schümann, Fionn O'Shea and Anna Schimrigk
Director: James Kent
Producer: Jack Arbuthnott, Malte Grunert, Ridley Scott, Carlo Dusi, Beth Pattinson and Joe Oppenheimer
Cast: Keira Knightley, Alexander Skarsgård, Jason Clarke, Martin Compston, Flora Thiemann, Kate Phillips, Jannik Schümann, Fionn O'Shea and Anna Schimrigk
