In real life, Christoph Waltz seems like a very marriageable bloke—unimpeachably charming, with sparkling eyes and sharp wit. His movie characters, however, are rarely so endearing. Roles like his turn in Django Unchained notwithstanding, Waltz has made his name playing bad guys—James Bond villains, Nazis, abusive circus owners, manipulative artists. Compared to them, his character in the upcoming Tulip Fever—as revealed in this first trailer—doesn’t look so bad. He’s just a rich dude whom Alicia Vikander’s character Sophia marries out of a society-propagated desire for security, as distilled into a quick lecture delivered by (who else?) Judi Dench. It’s all ordinary period-movie stuff. Until Sophia fakes her own death and goes for a little boat ride in a wooden coffin to escape the doldrums of married life. That’s new!

Nothing throws a wrench in things faster than when a movie’s young, beautiful trophy wife meets an equally young and beautiful man. And if he’s an artist like Dane DeHaan’s character is here in Tulip Fever? Forget it. The trailer doesn’t feature any “Draw me like one of your French girls” moments, but things definitely move in that direction, as it includes plenty of shots of the two canoodling. Eventually, Sophia tries to fake her own death, but given the tone of the trailer it seems we shouldn’t be too optimistic about how that turns out. What’s conspicuously kept out of the trailer, for obvious understandable reasons, is what happens when Waltz’s Cornelis Sandvoort (what a name!) finds out about any of this.

The movie, which hits theaters July 17, was directed by Justin Chadwick (Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, The Other Boleyn Girl). The screenplay was written by Tom Stoppard (Shakespeare in Love), based on the book by Deborah Moggach. It will be interesting to see how well these voices blend together—and ultimately, what sort of character they have Waltz playing. Will he be forgiving, or is this movie going to end with someone sleeping in a coffin for good?