Difficult Love

Two Lovers' DVD cover looks typical. But one shouldn't judge a book by the cover or a DVD by the front image. What I thought would be a predictable romance came out to be a stunning masterpiece where a troubled young man (talented Joaquin Phoenix) with a passion for photography has got to choose between an arranged marriage (Vinessa Shaw) and a beautiful but difficult lover he naturally feels connceted to (Gwyneth Paltrow).

Two Lovers takes its inspiration from Fyodor Dostoyevsky's short story White Nights and, like old Russian dramas, trows us into a middle of an emotional conflict where the choice between passion and convienience is not easy. It kept me masmerised and unsure about what was going to happed untill the very last last second of the film. And even after it finished I remained under the spell of this intimate story.

Directed by James Gray, released in 2008, also stars Isabella Rossellini, Moni Moshonow and Elias Kotenas.