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On the Italian island of Pantelleria, two peaceful lovers bask silent and undisturbed in the sultry heat.
Marianne (Tilda Swinton), a rock star of David Bowie proportions, is speechless following a throat operation. Her young lover Paul (Matthias Schoenaerts) is a wounded would-be documentary maker, tainted by a past alcohol addiction and suicide attempt. His psychological hurt is equalled by her physical injury. Their isolation is complete in a spotless villa high above the hills. They can swim in the sea, coat each other in mud and soothe each other with love and silence.
This is is all broken however, when Marianne’s ex-lover and music producer Harry (Ralph Fiennes) arrives unannounced, trailing his newly discovered teenage daughter Penelope (Dakota Johnson) in his wake. He is a brash alpha male; a caricature who bulldozes others, dominates conversations and laughs at his own jokes. He is painfully familiar. We have all met him. He bounds back into their life like an excitable puppy, unable to contemplate the idea that they might not want him there. But soon it becomes clear why he’s come. He is here to take Marianne back.
For the first thirty minutes, Luca Guadagnino’s remake of Jacques Deray’s 1969 psychological thriller La Piscine could easily be interchanged with that of a vacuous Richard Curtis film, but as the plot unfurls, the explosive power of jealousy eclipses rationality, replacing it with raw and unchecked corporeal desire. Harry and Paul’s rivalry exacerbates matters, while Penelope reveals herself as a twisted and manipulative product of her upbringing who enjoys torturing others just to see the looks on their faces. The four hurtle towards the film’s inevitable climax in such a hurricane of desire, jealousy and hatred that it is hardly surprising when one of them ends up dead at the bottom of the pool, that emblem of perfection and peace.
A Bigger Splash may be packaged as a flawless and glittering relationship drama but its dark heart is waiting within.