Revies: The Deep End (spoilers)

Maternal instinct at the max. if there's a problem with anything, Mom's there to clean it up and make everything right again. No matter what...
That's the general idea behind The Deep End , and the movie certainly does give interesting examples of this.
Margaret Hall (the superb Tilda Swinton) loves her children. Her husband is busy on a naval ship, and loving mother Margaret lives with her three children and her father-in-law in a picturesque house by a lake.
Margaret learns of her eldest son Beau's (Johnathan Tucker) affair with a sleazy thirty something Darby Reese who runs the local night club The Deep End. One night, after Margaret warns Darby away from Beau, Beau sneaks outside to meet Darby in the boathouse. A fight ensues, and the next morning Margaret finds Darby dead on the beach. Margaret panics and assumes that Beau had something to do with Darby's death. With maternal instincts run amuck, Margaret hides the evidence, and pretends that nothing happened. Things begin to get complicated when a black mailer (Goran Visnjic) visits Margaret at home.
The movie continues winding its way through the complicated plot. Where The Deep End fails, however, is in its attempts to create suspense. Without a mystery to solve, or any actual threat against our heroine, the audience isn't too terribley enthralled with the plot.
The movie succeeds in other aspects however, it has beautiful cinematography and direction, as well as wonderful acting from Tucker, Swinton, and Visnjic.
The Deep End works well as a character study of Margaret, but it fails as a thriller.
When Oscar season roles around, I'll be rooting for Tilda.

The Deep End: B