for a film touted as exploring relationships and black sexuality , trois is surprisingly tame . 
despite it's lurid subject matter and it's passing nod to fatal attraction , it moves along with flat , uninspired dialogue as it sets up a surprising climax that tries mightily to overthrow the considerable dead weight of the rest of the film . 
freshly moved to atlanta , jermaine ( dourdan ) and his wife , jasmine ( moore ) , have the trappings of a perfect life . 
they have a beautiful house in suburbia . 
jermaine is a lawyer on the fast track at his firm . 
jasmine is his supportive wife , who is finishing up her college degree . 
in an opening montage via a home video of the pair , we see the unremarkable story of their marriage and early marital triumphs . 
this is a couple that has it all . 
into this eden slithers the lure of lust . 
despite his outward appearance , jermaine reveals himself as selfish and covetous of his wife more as a possession than a person . 
a glimmer of his true nature peeks out during an early sex scene with his wife as he goes about his business , oblivious to jasmine's concerns . 
we also find that he has been relentlessly asking jasmine to participate in a menage- a-trois , much to jasmine's dismay . 
as jermaine puts it , " don't you want to be sexually free ? " 
jermaine shares his desire with co-worker terrence ( smith ) , who obligingly sets jermaine up with a woman who might be interested in just such an encounter . 
the woman , jade ( palmer ) is a direct counterpoint to jasmine . 
jade , at one point was a college student , too . 
unlike jasmine , she found herself pregnant , dropped out of school and now struggles to make ends meet . 
to further reinforce their differences , it's revealed that jade is involved in a custody battle over her son . 
inevitably , through liquor and a touch of duplicity on jermaine's part , the forbidden act is consummated . 
the aftermath of the encounter sidesteps into fatal attraction territory as acts of violence are perpetrated upon jermaine's property with the hint that the violence may escalate . 
by this point , trois shows itself to be a soap opera without the requisite melodrama : a fatal attraction without the social significance . 
the exploration of relationships is strictly superficial and stereotypical . 
jermaine comes off as insincere , sexually driven and selfish . 
jasmine is bland and subservient . 
jade comes off a bit sympathetically , but that is negated by her moral bankruptcy . 
yet another tale of a sexually aggressive " dog " of a man who imposes his will upon his accommodating , innocent mate . 
the last 10 minutes will undoubtly throw you a curve , but by this point , will you even care ? 
if the rest of the movie was as dynamic as the ending , perhaps there could have been some freshness to it . 
as it stands , trois is pretty standard fare .