That is the first line spoken in The End of the Affair, a peepshow romantic tragedy based on a book by Graham Greene that has vehement contempt for organized faith yet takes a moral stance in the vain of "thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife." I'm no fan of irony these days (a ridiculous statement, I know), but that contradiction proves to be the source of the film's electricity.

Britain, circa 1950: for years, Ralph Fiennes' obsessive novelist Maurice Bendrix has misunderstood the conclusion to his affair with the married Sarah Miles (Julianne Moore)--he thinks she grew as bored of him as she was of her civil servant husband, Henry (Stephen Rea). A rainy chance meeting with Henry irritates old wounds: Henry confides to Bendrix that Sarah's been sneaking around again, and he wants to put a tail on her. Posing as her jealous lover (which he still is), Bendrix hires a detective himself to follow Sarah, whom, it is unearthed, has become a deeply religious woman.

As director Neil Jordan's original screenplays often hang on a twist, the midway revelation of a churchgoing Sarah in Greene's 1951 metaphysical mystery must have enticed him into adapting it as much as the novel's thematic sumptuousness. While less shocking than the big reveals in either Jordan's The Crying Game or The Miracle, the jigsaw flashback technique he employs in The End of the Affair shrouds its central turn of plot in suspense, so that when it comes, it has a similar impact to those contained in the aforementioned movies, even if what we feel this time out is closer to relief than surprise.

I shan't tell you too much, but I will say that Sarah's choice sours Bendrix on Catholicism, God specifically. The picture's initial reservedness is indeed at odds with such lines as "I hate you, God," and with the unclothed lovemaking--it's Noel Coward's Brief Encounter if the participants were allowed to express themselves verbally and physically. Greene's text was filmed once before, in 1955, in a cinematic climate that was itching to punish sinner Sarah. Jordan's version is, forty-five years later, a less sanctimonious view of post-Hitler England. Sarah remains reprimanded, but we're permitted empathy for her, and for Bendrix, "a good hater."

Nor does Jordan reprobate Sarah for adultery. I recoiled from a first date scene in which she and Bendrix declare their love for one another, but the moment makes perfect sense in retrospect: chaos (in this case, WWII) speeds up and intensifies those emotions that lend themselves to vulnerability. Can you condemn anyone's passions during wartime, the great liberator?

I liked that the film showed us God-fearing characters who nevertheless fight Him every step of the way. If The End of the Affair achieves its message of fatalism through too much talk, you couldn't ask for better exposition. ("Pain is easy to write. In pain, we're all drably individual. But what can one write about happiness?") Another weakness is Moore, an actress I find runs hot and cold. Her performance here is stagy and preoccupied--I'm struggling to remember a time when she seemed truly in the moment as Sarah. Michael Nyman's unfathomably neglected, nostalgic score does much of the emoting on her behalf.

Columbia Tri-Star has released both The End of the Affairs on DVD individually and in a 2-pack. I watched only Jordan's "remake" for this review and came away impressed. Full-frame and 1.85:1, 16x9-enhanced letterboxed transfers are contained on the same side of a dual-layered disc. The look of Roger Pratt's evocative cinematography is intentionally gauzy, and blacks are watered-down, indicative, perhaps, of a purposely "flashed" negative, so I don't want to hear any complaints! I noticed some compression artifacts in a quick scan of the full-frame edition in the form of banding, but nothing too heinous.

Nyman's music is at nearly the same loudness in the rears as it is in the mains when listening to the 5.1 Dolby Digital soundmix--totally enveloping. (An isolated score, in majestic 5.1, is included; it is cued to the action and therefore rises and falls in volume as it would on-screen.) Bomb blasts resonate in the LFE channel and crumbling plaster makes delicate use of the split surrounds. Dialogue is clear and resonant.

Neil Jordan and Julianne Moore provide separate feature-length commentary tracks. His is the better of the two from a wannabe-filmmaker's perspective: he sheds light on every facet of the production. In addition to intelligently discussing her craft (and letting us in on a few trade secrets), Moore dishes out a lot of compliments to the crew. Because she didn't have a hand in the conception of the sets, etc., her graciousness is no more effective, really, than us doing the same thing. A good, six-minute featurette, trailers for The End of the Affair (full-frame, 5.1) and The Remains of the Day (must be upcoming on DVD), production notes, and "talent files" end this affair.-Bill Chambers