Two Lovers

Perhaps this love triangle is a bit too big for this man who has been so disappointed by life and love so far. Leonard (Joaquin Phoenix) has just thrown himself into the freezing water from a bridge near Brooklyn, when a sudden twitch and his subsequent recovery show that he still has a spark of will to survive. This is not the first suicide attempt by Leonard, who moves back in with his worried parents (Isabella Rossellini/Moni Moshonov) and allows them to set him up with the daughter of one of his father's business partners: the lovely but somewhat well-behaved Sandra (Vinessa Shaw). Leonard allows himself to be approached. But then he meets a woman for whom he would drop everything: Michelle (Gwyneth Paltrow) is volatile, shimmering, beautiful - and has recently moved into the apartment opposite. It is financed by her married lover. Michelle initially sees Leonard, who is deeply in love, as her best friend - and he has to make a hard decision. "Two Lovers" is the third collaboration between director James Gray and US star Joaquin Phoenix. They previously worked together on the magnificently dark anti-hero portraits of "Heroes of the Night" and "The Yards", in which young New Yorkers struggle to find their place in the world between hope and disillusionment. The love tragedy "Two Lovers" ventures into more romantic, but no less melancholy realms of an actually impossible decision. It is about the well-known, difficult to overcome opposites of security and passion, of closeness and distance. This is also reflected in the sensitive, restrained interior design, which transports us to a New York off the beaten tourist track and opens up an emotional love drama.