There’s a kind of mopey cinema, plodding and lugubrious, that’s often mistaken for artistic sensitivity in creating in-depth character studies and exploring important issues. My Policeman, currently streaming on Amazon, is a good example of this enervating sort of film.

It’s a love story set in 1950s Brighton, England, about the two people contending for the love of the handsome title character, Tom Burgess (Harry Styles). One is an elegant gay man working as a museum curator, Patrick Hazelwood (David Dawson), who’s involved in a passionate affair with Tom. The other is an insecure heterosexual woman, Marion Taylor (Emma Corrin), who becomes Tom’s wife.

Older cast members play the characters later in life, when Marion (Gina McKee) is caring for the gravely ill Patrick (Rupert Everett) over the objections of Tom (Linus Roache), who broke off with him many years earlier. As Marion reads Patrick’s diaries about the two men’s great youthful love, we see it enacted in lengthy flashbacks.