Two Lovers

Aroview: Joaquin Phoenix (in reputedly his final film) re-teams with dir. James Gray for this acutely observed ‘anti-romance’, about a bipolar man drawn into relationships with two vastly different women.

While something of a departure from Gray’s previous crime thrillers (THE YARDS, WE OWN THE NIGHT), the director maintains the elegant shot-making and sophisticated tone that distinguished those movies from the pack, and not without the recognisable motifs of his self-assured cinema either (namely, the dreary Brighton Beach landscape). The performances, if a little goofy and self-conscious, are in themselves striking and truthful, rendering this a certainly odd – and introverted – but ultimately rewarding film about fraught relationships and unfulfilled love.

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