The Affair (2004) User Reviews

TL;DR

[joecaren · 3/10 · 7 April 2022]

Nice video quality, some pretty places and pretty faces.

Writing was almost as good as an after school special written by high school students.

The acting wasn't.

Couldn't force myself to finish yet another bad movie.

If we only cared about the characters....

[gradyharp · 5/10 · 4 January 2007]

Belgian Carl Colpaert has a solid reputation as the founder of CINEVILLE Releasing, as a producer of some very fine small films (Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont, Where Eskimos Live, Surviving Eden, Hurlyburly, etc) and has directed and written a few less interesting ones. This film THE AFFAIR (originally titled TOPANGA) tries hard to be a European flavored examination of relationships, but for this viewer it falls short not only in story (scripted by Colpaert and Lisa Larrivee) and in a fuzzy cast of TV actors, but also in the directorial stance of being in control of a story that needs a lot of attention.

Jean (Kelsey Oldershaw) is a bored housewife living in a designer house with her architect husband Paul (Horacio Le Don), a man of success who is so self-centered and controlling that he forgets his relationship obligations to his wife. Jean has residual scars from a traumatic childhood experience and her needs go beyond the wifely role, searching for some degree of excitement, passion and fulfillment not available in her marriage. At a local dance club she meets Viggo (Andy Mackenzie), a bohemian passionate, live for the moment guy who sweeps Jean off her feet in an affair that produces disaster in her marriage. The story concentrates on the intricacies of this love triangle, offering alternative ways to approach love, needs, and responsibilities.

The notion is solid (if quite over used) and there are aspects of the film that suffuse the atmosphere with tension and artsy techniques. But in the end the story and the actors elude our concern and we are left feeling like window peeping voyeurs, wondering why we are sneaking a peek. Grady Harp

Good movie lozy ending

[teddyber-51665 · 5/10 · 1 December 2023]

Who is the father and why did she cheat and get caught and won't let the husband be the father he wants to be if it is his. The other guy she should have dump his ass . He into drugs and she wants to be with him with a kid some of these movies are stupid so is there going to be part 2 to find out who is the father.it seemed her husband wanted to still be there for her and it also seemed he changed after dhe cheated on him.why is it everytime a guy got a beautiful woman he cheats or a women got a guy that treats her right but she cheats. If the woman wants to find her self why in the world fid dhe get married in the first place.

The Simp and his 304.

[TheRedbanker · 12 February 2023]

Jean is a beautiful but selfish woman who doesn't appreciate her comfortable stay-at-home lifestyle with her fairly affluent architect husband Paul. She lives in a luxurious cliffside home in Los Angeles, CA. Curiously a home that remains sparsely decorated even after years of marital habitation.

Rather than be grateful for what she has with Paul, Jean decides to begin an affair with a trailer trash hoodrat named Viggo.

Jean decides to bring the vagabond Viggo into Paul's home to have sex. When Paul arrives before the dirty deed can begin, Paul and Viggo get into a mild tussle. But no blood is shed. Later Jean and Paul argue over the state of their marriage. Jean tells Paul that she feels "suffocated" from their relationship but seconds later tells Paul that his home doesn't truly belong to him because he is barely ever there.

Jean must have been feeling dizzy from her whirlwind affair and forgot that Paul is barely home because he's out working all day to pay for her luxurious freeloading lifestyle. But I digress.

Paul proves to us that he's the ultimate simp when he starts begging Jean to come back to him after she decides to move into Viggo's trailer park abode.

Paul's business partner is also a spousal loser who encourages Paul to keep simping to Jean instead of letting her go.

Paul then does the unthinkable and invites Jean, Viggo, and Viggo's other side-piece chic into his well-kept home to continue his sad simping plan to try and get Jean back.

Paul even allows Viggo to spend the night in his home, in the guest bedroom with Jean!!!???

But, before the night ends somehow Paul and Viggo end up in the same room when Jean and the side-piece chic kick Paul out of his own bedroom. As a result, Paul and Viggo end up having a kind of bros before 304s moment and seem to call it a truce.

In the morning at the breakfast table, Jean tells the entire motley crue she's pregnant, causing Paul to say he won't pay for the child's upbringing and for Viggo to say that he will suddenly get a job. I'm guessing something he probably hadn't considered would be personally beneficial since he was an 11-year-old paperboy.

Side note: If anything like this ever happens in real life, a dude who simps this bad must have his male card revoked. Immediately!

I couldn't take anymore of this crap and had to turn it off there. SMH. The End (for me anyway).

Like a mediocre porn film without the sex

[mjbarr · 1/10 · 20 January 2007]

After about watching 45 minutes of this film, my wife and I gave up. There was no reason to care about any of the characters. The husband was a bore. The wife needed a career. Viggo needed to grow up. The acting,dialog, and soundtrack was on par with a bad adult film. We sat there predicting nearly every line anyone would say. Except for the wife admitting she had an abortion instead of a miscarriage.

Both the husband's and Viggo's psycho babble about meteors and the planets was laughable. "In wine there is truth" Did the writers really listen to these lines?

It was not ever explained how a woman with no job always had money, the same thing for Viggo. He didn't work, yet lived near the ocean, had a constant supply of marijuana and other drugs, and always had money to go out to the clubs.

When we saw Starr's penis painting and then when she started her chanting, we were rolling in laughter.

It would have benefited from the inclusion of explicit sex and being marketed as an adult feature and we would have maybe appreciated it better after a few dozen bong hits and bottles of wine.

Unrealistic Value Views

[clopezjr · 2/10 · 29 December 2022]

I watch this movie with no true expectations. I was frustrated with the Paul (aka the husband) character. He is literally the poster child of a chump / a plan B. His wife crapped all over him and he just taking it over and over and over. He'd kick her out and took her back almost immediately. Was she that fantastic a lover that she could what she wanted. I wanted to reach into the screen, yank him out and beat the hell out of him. The wife lied to him on several occasions from where she was, to were she was going, to enough what she was doing. I understand the guy was a jerk but he at lest deserve the respect from his suppose wife to be truthful to him. I get it, she's unhappy but don't go around screwing other people while professing that you love that person. And these people do not live in the real world. They spend money like it's nothing. A one point in the movie, the wife gives her lover $1500 like it was nothing. Remeber this was supposedly set around 2004. Who's got that kind of money to be tossing it around. These people need to Iive in the real world to see the consequence of their actions. I was extremely disappointed with the ending. I assume they're divorcing because she wasn't wearing her wedding ring. But she did not look pregnant at all. And the paternity of the child was never discussed any further. No one took any responsibility or suffer any consequence for their actions. If you looking for a movie for scenery, it's ok. For you're looking for a good acting, it's so-so but if you'll like for a good movie, keep looking. All you'll find here is disappointment. No true ending just unanswered questions.

It's the not you- it's me excuse

[jordondave-28085 · 2/10 · 27 March 2023]

(2004) Topanga/ The Affair DRAMA

"It's not you- it's me!" excuse routine, with co-written and directed by Carl Colpaert has good for nothing, childless wife Jean (Kelsey Oldershaw) yearning for more attention since her successful workaholic architect husband, Paul (Horacio Le Don) is spending less time with her. Well, duh! As a result of feeling unfulfilled, she picks up and makes out with a care free, free spirited bumm, Viggo (Andy Mackenzie) she met at a house dance party, who sleeps in a van and owes people money. This as a result of filling unfulfilled of not having any children to satisfy her mom as opposed to her other siblings.

I hate movies in which one spouse has the affections all wrapped around a persons finger. In this case, it's Jean who has Paul wrapped in her little finger like she has him on a leash, in which she cheats on him with zero consequence- he does not even cheat on her as he has a job and she doesn't. The first time Jean cheats on her husband, he had the opportunity to divorce her, and it's not even a consideration, as she believes she has earned the money he brings home for cheating on him. He should be grateful he does not have any kids with her and end up in the Maury Povich show, for she would have sued him for spousal support. So what does Paul do, he becomes a whiner, like, there are thousands of other single woman who would not mind being with a successful architect and yet, all of his affections is geared toward her, as if she is the last woman on earth . Jean is a skank who does not mind exploiting the money he brings home on her extra-marital affairs. It is quite obvious those marriage vows meant absolutely nothing to her, for she just blatantly gives $1,500 to her good for nothing new lover. I agree with one of the viewers who said it's a movie that attempts to be an European movie but fails in almost aspect.

... something uniquely mostly awkward

[bjarias · 4/10 · 6 February 2024]

. no one talks like these people ... no one acts like these people ... from one moment to the next they're continually doing-saying things not making much of any sense ... evenly inconsistent throughout ... not the worst film of whatever genre it is, yet coming very-close to being unwatchable

... take-a-way the unnecessary pauses and half the film gets chopped-off ... film's been around now couple decades and never have come across it before now... kinda wishing had not at all ... twenty years and with little more than one hundred thirty IMDb ratings.. that'll tell ya more than anyone putting required number of characters to print.

A very well-crafted dramatic love story.

[anmi3103 · 9/10 · 2 July 2004]

I was fortunate enough to catch a screening of this film, which I heard had just garnered several top awards at the Worldfest in Houston. I was particularly anxious to see the movie after learning it was helmed by Carl Colpaert, a talented producer/director originally from Belgium who has had the unique "Midas Touch" of discovering unknown talent and giving them their first big break. In fact, Kevin Spacey, Salma Hayek, Vincent D'Onofrio, and Renee Zellweger are just some of the "unknowns" who got their start in Colpaert's films and went on to stellar careers. THE AFFAIR is a very well-crafted dramatic love story, reminiscent of the simpler love story films of the 60s and 70s. Parts of the film which take place on the road reminded me of Stanley Donen's classic 1967 film TWO FOR THE ROAD, with Audrey Hepburn and Albert Finney. The beautiful Kelsey Oldershaw plays Jean, a young woman who constantly seeks an ever-elusive fulfillment in her life, largely due to a traumatic childhood experience. She is married to Paul, played by the talented Horatio Ledon, who is overbearing, authoritative, and seeks to control every facet of Jean's life. Jean finds a breath of fresh air in a hot affair with Viggo, played by Andy Mackenzie, a product of Topanga's Bohemian set who is the exact opposite of Paul. Viggo is like a wild stallion, untamed, unfettered, and eager to fill the gaping void in Jean's life. The film offers a quite surprising, non-traditional view of how Paul and Jean deal with this, for lack of a better term, bizarre love triangle. The film was shot beautifully on HD, with a classy fade-to-black cut after each sequence, to give one the sense of watching individual vignettes, Chekovian "slices of life," strung together in a linear yet loose and free fashion. With their excellent performances, Oldershaw, Ledon, and Mackenzie definitely have a great shot at joining the pantheon of Hollywood stars that Colpaert has had the knack of discovering in the past.

...very beautiful stylish film, worth the time.

[Edward_O · 9/10 · 30 June 2004]

Besides the Hollywood star-power I found this very grown up story great to watch and amazingly true to a society that needs to accept the power of passion and love. A commitment to finding an inner truth in a women of the present day! Kelsey Oldershaw convinces and finds great company with Andy McKenzie and Horatio LeDon. The look of this movie is so perfect and the mood is so unpretentious as I did not see it in a long time since the best relationship dramas from France at their peak in the early 70- s. The whole environment is so very true to the contemporary situation in a troubled or maybe every relationship as questions and situations of truth and motivation come to a surface and find adults often unprepared. A very beautiful film that does still leave a lot of room to enjoy and listen and reflect into personal experiences.

Terrific movie, grossly underrated

[mikls10 · 10/10 · 20 December 2008]

The film is a fresh breeze of 70th-style realism in our screen. The magnificence of the film is that it's deeply philosophical without being snobbish. In a few words the film shows how craziness of modern-day life destroys families without putting blame on either gender, but instead emphasizes on the affect of the society on relationships probably best described in the monologue of the "Frenchy". But the film perfectly avoids the diseases of many philosophical films: it does not fall into a "statement" movie shoving the ideas down your throat nor does it "artistically" over-complicates them. What makes it great that the film walks the fine line never falling into either of these categories. It's perfectly dynamic, watchable and enjoyable without compromising integrity. Did we become too dumbed down by media and rotten with all the aliens, vampires and violence garbage that we cannot watch a "normal" story anymore? I have no other explanation how this terrific film that received 4 golden awards went unnoticed by public and is even out if print now. Some user comments here confirm my point. What probably does not add to its popularity is that the film is rather gloomy and does not have a happy ending, it's simply truthful. On top of great plot and directing the film has an outstanding cast which is also probably out of the favor of the media. I have no other explanation why I never heard of these terrific actors. First and foremost is of course Kelsey Oldershaw who seemed to have no limits. She can show such a variety of emotions just by the expression on her face - it's amazing. Another great actor is Andy Mackenzie who has a wide palette of his own. My overall score: perfect 10.