On Chesil Beach

On Chesil Beach is a 2017 British drama film directed by Dominic Cooke (in his feature directorial debut) and written by Ian McEwan, who adapted his own 2007 Booker Prize-nominated novella of the same name. It stars Saoirse Ronan and Billy Howle and tells the story of virgins, Florence and Edward, and their first disastrous attempt at having sex on their wedding night. The initial experience and their differing responses to the failure have lifelong consequences for both. The film had its world premiere in the Special Presentations section at the Toronto International Film Festival on 7 September 2017, and was released in the United States and United Kingdom in May 2018. Plot In 1962, Edward Mayhew and Florence Ponting first meet after graduating from their respective universities. He is an historian at University College, London and rock-and-roll lover; she a classical violinist at Oxford with her own quartet. They fall in love quickly, meet each other's families, and eventually decide to get married, despite their differences in background and social status. Florence is secretly anxious about the wedding due to her fears about sex, but there is no one with whom she can discuss it. On Edward and Florence's honeymoon at Chesil Beach, their backgrounds and temperaments come to the fore: Edward's quickness to anger and occasional physical belligerence, and Florence's unspoken relationship with her father, who obviously dominates her. They are both inexperienced sexually, and their first attempt at sex goes badly wrong when Florence’s trauma of being molested by her father is triggered. She flees along the beach, where she is confronted by an angry Edward. Not able to say what is wrong she tells him that although she loves him very much and wants to be with him for life, she can only be a platonic wife. Edward angrily rejects the idea. The couple part ways, and their marriage is annulled.