Netflix’s Fatal Affair – A Dull Trashy Thriller

For as long as there have been films, there has been the subgenre known as trash. They are inevitable as most viewers have surely come across a trashy film at some point in their lives. Their intentional or unintentionally questionable nature have often entertained, be it ridiculous stories, over-the-top acting, or dreadful dialog, but sometimes films are just simply bad. Unfortunately or not, Netflix’s latest romantic thriller, Fatal Affair, falls under the latter though this should not come as much of a surprise to anyone familiar with any film. Though some may indeed find entertainment within this mess, most will surely find it a tedious and dull chore of a film that brings absolutely nothing new whatsoever to the table (or even tries to), seemingly going out of its way to eliminate any possible entertainment value. Its painfully derivative nature, along with dull characters and dialog, make it easy to tune it out fairly quickly.

Most have, for the most part, seen Fatal Affair countless times before in either theatrical or tv movies but the story this time around saw a woman named Ellie (Long) have a wrench thrown in to her marital problems with her husband Marcus (Bishop) in the form of an old friend named David (Epps) who miraculously returned in her life. One can pretty much decipher what happens next as things were obviously not as they seemed. There isn’t that much more to say about it seeing that in order to get from beginning to end, the story unsurprisingly takes a fair share of ridiculous leaps while character make questionable decisions to justify itself and to establish tension and suspense. However, it would all be for naught as it all adds up to something too dull and predictable to care. Though many are probably not watching this for the story to begin with, the film will more likely lead viewers to roll their eyes more than be entertained in any way. Its only saving grace is its running time, clocking in at under 90 minutes.

Long and Epps clearly do what they can here as Ellie and David but their dull and derivative characters along with their lack of chemistry fail to sell the narrative. Fatal Affair lives or dies on that fact alone and this was where the film failed. They merely go through the paces while being weighed down by cliches and mediocre dialog. Meanwhile, Bishop as Marcus was just there.

In the end, Fatal Affair is a film that doesn’t try to be more than what it is. In fact, it doesn’t try at all. The above review may read as an indictment but in reality, it is neither a film that’s so bad that it’s good nor one that is infuriatingly bad, just one that fits somewhere in the middle and where’s the fun in that?

still courtesy of Netflix

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Keith Noakes

The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.