Ordinarily, I do not like films written by Woody Allen. They are character driven but often immoral and with a complete misdirection of any form of values. I was therefore surprised that, despite all of the above, Match Point is actually a very memorable and intriguing film, and not at all what I expected due to a multi-layered twist ending.

Chris Wilton (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) is a non-pro tennis player who has left the travel circuit and is now searching for employment teaching rich snobs how to improve their game in country clubs. It is not what he really wants to do with his life, but for now he has no other options. Fortunately for him, one of his students happens to be Tom Hewett (Matthew Goode), the only son of an extremely wealthy local businessman heavily invested in stock portfolio management. The pair of them discover how much they have in common and it's not too long before Tom drafts Chris into his inner circle of friends. Tom's younger sister Chloe (Emily Mortimer) is immediately infatuated with the newest member of the household, and he starts seeing her on the side. That's when he meets the ambitious and spunky Nola Rice (Scarlett Johansson), an aspiring American actress who has recently become engaged to Tom, despite the disapproval of his pretentious parents (Brian Cox, Penelope Wilton).

The attraction is immediate but Nola will have none of it and constantly gives Chris the brush-off. A couple of years later, Chris is married and his wife is pushing for them to have children ... when he happens to discover that Nola is back in town. Their affair begins a tangled web of secrecy and lies that will turn deadly in the second half, making for an intense drama that satisfies on most levels. I thought at the time Match Point would be a movie I'd see once and move past, but that's not what happened: three days later, it was still in my head! That is the mark of a good drama, that it lingers with you -- either with fascination or horror.

I will say right up front that despite Jonathan Rhys Meyers' attempts to justify his character's behavior, this film is not about misguided but ultimately good people caught up in impossible situations. No one's behavior is above reproach and audiences expecting some form of retaliation for the events contained therein will be disappointed. I cannot say too much more than that without giving away the ending. The acting is extremely well done, although I have become so accustomed to Meyers as psychotic or immoral characters that I immediately did not like or trust him. He does show the appropriate amount of grief and guilt over his actions, but throughout I got the impression he was no more than a self-serving opportunist. Nola knows what she is doing and becomes stronger willed than I anticipated, and poor Chloe is completely oblivious to the truth.

Match Point carries a deserved R-rating but did not exploit it nearly as much as I expected. Chris and Chloe become sexually involved long before their marriage, and share the film's only graphic scene (lots of movement and heavy breathing, but no nudity), but the rest of the sexual content is all made up of passionate kissing or heavy making out. There's a tiny amount of profanity but a half dozen or more abuses of Jesus' name. It's implied but not shown that two people are shot. Lots of conversation revolves around making babies and fertility clinics. Chloe tries without success to entice her husband to sleep with her.

To be honest, going into this film I had The Tudors on my brain and was surprised at the similarities between JRM's characters: in both instances, he is cheating on a mild-mannered and empathetic wife by a somewhat manipulative but sexy young woman, and ultimately his behavior spirals out of control. The irony that his mistress was played by Johansson was not lost on me either, since she recently appeared as Henry VIII's mistress in The Other Boleyn Girl. Oh, how history repeats itself!