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Thursday, March 14, 2019

On Chesil Beach (2017)

For once I think the movie is better than the book.  It is based on Ian McEwan's novel of the same name, which opens with a line that pretty much sums up the content:  "They were young, educated, and both virgins on this, their wedding night, and they lived in a time when a conversation about sexual difficulties was plainly impossible."
It is hard for people to talk about sex, and in 1962 one can only imagine that it was no better.  Florence (played by the very talented Saoirse Ronon) very clearly loves her young husband, but she struggles with physical intimacy to the point where she is just not sure if she is capable of it.  Her new husband who is equally inept in the bedroom handles it poorly, and with hurt feelings they part ways, to the tremendous embarrassment of both of them.  The rest of the movie reflects on the downstream effect of that single night, and what might have been if it had all gone differently.

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