Back home from her morning walk in the foggy English countryside, a retired school teacher (Charlotte Rampling) greets the postman who relays a letter for her husband (Tom Courtenay) stating that the body his former lover has been retrieved in the Swiss Alps some five decades after her death. Now, as the happily married couple prepares for an anniversary celebration, details of that ancient tryst seep into their lives and quickly poison the well. 45 Years, which director Andrew Haigh drew on a David Constantine short story, is subtle, nuanced, and very particular filmmaking, the type that calls for revisitation upon which it would assumedly reveal more of itself. Rampling turns in a brilliant, expressive performance and Courtenay is her equal playing a decent man doing a poor job of hiding his affection for a dead woman.
*** 1/2 out of ****
