The Aftermath

Knightley's character is - hello! - more sympathetic and sensual than in the novel, while Clarke's is more one-dimensional, to the point of caricature.

It does not achieve the emotional resonance that it's looking for, but Keira Knightly does wear some great dresses.

A shallow excuse for attractive actors to get their kit off.

When all of these various plot strands do finally collide they do so with a heavy-handed thud that's both obnoxiously coincidental as well as being emotionally disingenuous.

The film aspires to be an epic romance but the qualities necessary to make it soar aren't in place. Instead, it's a curiosity for history buffs and those who enjoy middling period piece melodramas.

Its moves are telegraphed to anyone who's ever seen a stately period romance, and its handsome production can't overcome its myriad clichés.

If you take away The Aftermath’s post-war Reconstruction of Germany’s setting, what you have is a lonely housewife having an affair with a pool boy, and a lonely couple in desperate need of a premium cable subscription.

It does not bode well for a story of a tumultuous affair if the only performance with conviction, in a love triangle, is given by the betrayed husband.

The Aftermath is far from a great film, so deeply mired in genre conventions that playing a period piece drinking game while watching would have you in an ambulance within the first half-hour. But it's much too fun to get angry about.

An interesting canvas on which to paint this story but unfortunately the love story feels torn from the pages of a not-so-steamy Harlequin Romance.