Temptation Machination: Sullivan Explores Ills of Infidelity in Extramarital Thriller

“The house is new but the man is not,” jests the unfortunate protagonist in Peter Sullivan’s situational adult thriller Fatal Affair, the usual euphemism to explain the lackluster romance universal to all long-term relationships. The reverse is true for the scenario, however. First-time scribe Rasheeda Garner, in a script co-written by Sullivan, mines the social clichés which defined a whole generation’s worth of adult-minded cinema of the late 1980s and 1990s, titles its derivative title channels directly (Fatal Attraction, Final Analysis, Basic Instinct are but a few which immediately come to mind).

Like a slew of similarly themed resurrections featuring Black characters, Sullivan and Garner shove a spigot into increasingly neglected material, and even as the clichés unleashed are profuse, so are the reminders of how entertaining and refreshingly adult these scenarios can be with the right cast, such as the energies Nia Long and Omar Epps (reuniting after starring as compromised lovers in 1999’s In Too Deep) conjure.

Successful lawyer Ellie (Long) seems to have the perfect life. Having recently moved out of San Francisco to the beachside area called Ocean Crest with her husband Marcus (Steven Bishop), she’s about to open her own law firm while their affable daughter Brittany (Aubrey Cleland) attends Berkley. But her husband, still recovering from a vehicular accident, seems to have grown a little distant with all of life’s recent changes. On one of her last cases with her old law firm, Ellie is re-introduced to an old college friend, David (Omar Epps). Unbeknownst to her, David continues to foster a considerable crush, and his recent divorce, to a woman who supposedly looks like Ellie, allows her to tap into a nostalgic yearning for the past. Wheedling his way into drinks with Ellie, the two share an alcohol-infused moment of passion at a bar, which she puts a stop to before it gets out of control. But David is smitten, and determined to pursue Ellie despite her protestations, no matter the cost.

There’s a fine line differentiating categories of camp and soap opera, and Fatal Affair has the gall to take itself seriously whilst foregoing contemporary realities and land somewhere in a grey zone of B-movie antics. Garner and Sullivan remain vague on the occupational realities of its principle characters, from lawyers, to architects to law enforcement, everyone is outfitted with generic jargon which remain vague and unfulfilling for those desiring more attention to detail.

Relying on familiar tropes, such as Ellie’s journey from temptation and redemption, including requisite exposition through a visit to tangential characters from her shared past with David, which drops into the scenario like a juicy gossip bomb. And yet, there’s something kind of touching about Long’s portrayal, even as she’s written as barely skirting onto the path of temptation, while her relationship with Steven Bishop’s Marcus also steers clear of schmaltzy overcompensation—at the end of the day, however, this is a faux-adultery scenario, not unlike the PG-13 situation involving Idris Elba, Beyoncé and Ali Larter in the camp-light Obsession (2009).

As compelling as Long can be, and those who recognize the worth of seeing her in the lead have more than enough to relish here, the nagging thought of switching Epps’ and Bishop’s casting hovers in the film’s ether. As does the strangely underutilized presence of Estelle, playing Linda, the secretary of Ellie, who has such brief sequences she doesn’t even have a whole line of dialogue (but she’s featured in the soundtrack, so there’s that). If we’re stuck comparing Fatal Affair to recent adult-themed scenarios comprised of or aimed at Black audiences, Sullivan and Garner manage something a lot more entertaining than The Intruder (2019), which features similar dynamics for a couple moving outside of San Francisco, or The Perfect Guy (2015). If anything, the film’s likeability is a testament to the power of its leading lady, and reaches the same favorable vein as 2014’s No Good Deed—not to mention, it arrives at the perfect moment to exemplify what an “entanglement” often looks like.

★★½/☆☆☆☆☆