Based on the 1990 novel of the same name, “Deception” is centered on, of all things, an abrasive-yet-celebrated American author named Philip Roth (Denis Podalydès) who has relocated to London despite his conviction that the city is populated entirely by antisemites. The bulk of the story revolves around his affair with an unnamed and unhappily married English actress (Léa Seydoux). Lest you get too thrilled by that prospect, most of their time together consists of post-coital conversations in which familiar thematic tropes of Roth’s begin to come out and we are often left to wonder about what the exact nature of their relationship might be after all.
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When she isn’t around, though, there are other women for Philip to talk to or think back on, including an old friend in America dying of cancer, a former student of his that he once had an affair with, and a Czech woman he met during the heady days of the Prague Spring in 1968. Oh yeah, there is also Roth’s wife, who discovers a notebook in which he goes on at length about the actress and becomes convinced that the passion of his words must mean that he’s having an affair—after all, he doesn’t write or talk about her like that anymore. He claims that the woman is nothing more than a figment of his literary imagination and that she should just relax.
