It’s a story as old as time: a woman falls in love with a man who pushed her to become a mother; The man falls in love with the woman and, either by accident or desire, she is eventually allowed to have extramarital affairs that she can show him in the face until he makes a lewd joke about killing a former lover and suddenly develops a fondness for the actual developed murder.
With Deep Water now streaming on Hulu, the adult thriller has risen from the grave with a wealth of trash style and star power. (Shoutout to Ana de Armas and Ben Affleck and all their memorable COVID paparazzi content.) And suffice it to say, you don’t exactly have to be a therapist to know that a quid pro quo that a kid is on involved, and rampant infidelities are. t necessarily the hallmarks of a healthy marriage. But because we’re as committed to getting expert opinions as Affleck’s betrayed Vic is to his snails, I called one anyway. For Laura Young, a Manhattan-based psychotherapist and marriage counselor, the relationship at the heart of Deep Water has many red flags — and it’s not just because all of Melinda’s partners are dying all the time. Below, we discuss the troubled conditions of the Van Allens’ marriage, the importance of keeping no secrets from your spouse, and how to make challenging (and homicide-free) relationships work.
Now that you’ve had a chance to see it Deep waterwhat did you like and what not?
I don’t know what your definition of a dysfunctional couple is, but sometimes when I look at couples I think there’s usually a function and a dysfunction. At first I hated the movie. I was like, on a personal level, ‘Oh my god, this is so gross’. But on a professional level, I found it kind of interesting how they posit this idea of this dysfunction in both characters – it kind of weaves into their own level of functionality.
It’s also not clear if you end up seeing that there’s a new understanding within the couple. That she would accept him the way he had accepted her in a strange way. He wasn’t really stepping on it, he didn’t really want to know what she was doing, which led to his fantasies, his speculations. He never saw her having sex; It was only assumed that they had sex. She could have been a cock tease.
One thing that bothered me: I’m not a man, but I can’t believe these men would be so willing to flaunt a relationship with a woman in front of her husband, especially a high-profile alpha like the Ben Affleck character . That seemed a bit unrealistic to me.
The only thing I could think of was that they assumed humiliating him in front of his wife would turn him on – that he was okay with the arrangement.
Yes, that could be a reframe in their minds. But if it’s clear he’s not turned on – I don’t know. I just don’t know that many men would literally look at a lion, get a warning shot, and further provoke the lion.
The other thing that really bothered me, because I’m very technical at times, when he rode the bike, he didn’t have toe clips. I found that ridiculous. There was no way he could mountain bike through those hills without having toe braces.
Vic almost treats Melinda like a trophy wife. It seems like he pushed her towards parenthood when she didn’t want to start a family. She doesn’t have much maternal instinct with her little daughter. what are your thoughts there
I work with couples and I’m not sure if that’s a true statement because even at the end you see her with the girl on the couch. It is clear that she loves her child. Have you ever seen the movie “The Lost Daughter”?
Yes, I have.
Most mothers have conflicting feelings when it comes to having children. Both love them and feel burdened by them. Her body changes—everything changes when a woman has the baby. I found that interesting, and then there’s always the whole idea that since the woman is carrying the baby, how could he get her to have a baby? Because even if she had gotten pregnant, couldn’t she have had an abortion and said it was a miscarriage? She’s not a stupid person.
I don’t know very many women who would have a baby if they didn’t really want it. She doesn’t come across as a friendly person. I have a hard time believing that she would sacrifice anything because she is very selfish.
So this is where it gets tricky: Vic starts killing his wife’s lovers and covers up the murders to make them look like accidents. Melinda becomes suspicious, but she can’t prove anything. What should she do in this situation?
First of all I don’t know how much she knew and didn’t know because how could you not know what he did to the blonde guy saying “I killed the other guy to scare him off.” Then the guy lands dead at the pool and he’s going around town supposedly telling people he killed the first guy. Why doesn’t this girl realize her husband is dangerous?
I think she likes it. In fact, when you see, the best sex happens after a heated fight because the whole dynamic is, “You’d be so bored without me.” She’s always happy when he surprises her. So there’s something about their pathology that really goes off when the male lion comes to protect his pride. In reality, if someone does that and wants to get out of a situation, I would think that you would document evidence and give it to the police.
What, if anything, can Vic’s creepy collection of snails tell us about his psychological profile?
So I Googled snails, and one of the things about snails is metamorphosis. Perhaps that was the image or metaphor the author wanted: the metamorphosis of these characters.
Can you think of any movies or TV shows that provide a compelling example of how couples are portrayed and how they deal with marital disputes?
Big little lies. I really liked how they presented this pair [played by Nicole Kidman and Alexander Skarsgard] and the dilemma of both parties and how she got support from all her friends when they killed him. He had moments of regret, but in the end he couldn’t handle his own emotions and he didn’t do any of his own work.
Do you have any final advice for the couple in Deep water?
I’d say look, if you don’t want him killing anymore, don’t make out with other people. That would go a long way in curbing his behavior and then something new would happen, right? They would find other ways not to get bored. Because it really feels like the issue in this relationship is boredom, but I think the boredom is just a facade. Something else happens that bores you. If you really want a meaningful relationship, the core is vulnerability. So in a way their discovery [that he’s killing her lovers] makes her vulnerable and makes him vulnerable too, right?
And look, there are all these tools. You could roleplay him as a stranger in a bar. He could even wear a costume, like new hair and makeup, a mustache, and she could pick him up and they could have wild, passionate sex behind the bar as a teenager or whatever, right? Just use your imagination in a way that doesn’t harm other people.
This interview has been edited and shortened for clarity.
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