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A wife who is unhappy for some time because of communication problems with her husband, is waiting for him late at night to talk to him. When he walks in, she said:

Wife: I almost wish you'd taken a mistress.

Husband: Don't come on to me with that kind of talk Janet, put in a hard day, and I'm tired.

Wife: I know how to fight a woman but how do I fight work.

Husband: You're talking silly, you work as hard as I do.

Wife: It's 12:30, and you're you're just getting home from the office. Movie - The gift of love (53:33-53:42)

The first sentence is interesting in structure. Firstly, I think "I almost wish" is not the same as "I wish", so unlike "I wish", she can't be wanting what she said after "I almost wish". So far so good. I understand this.

Secondly, I think the wife is talking about a hypothetical situation(unreal present), where I would have expected "I almost wish you took (not had taken) a mistress." OR "I almost wish you would take a mistress."

However, she uses past perfect after "wish", which creates a meaning in my mind as if she wants something to have been different in the past, whereas she is actually talking about the present situation. That is what I don't quite understand.

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    Are you seriously saying you don't understand the meanings of the utterances in this conversation? As opposed to not understanding the choice of vocabulary, verb tenses, syntax, etc. Please clarify this point, and explain exactly which specific possible alternative meanings you're unable to choose between.
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Oct 21 at 14:42
  • btw - you should have looked for a better subtitle file. What you've copied here includes a number of distracting transcription errors.
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Oct 21 at 14:43
  • You're right about "almost wish". As for take a mistress, the meaning of "take" is in a dictionary, with respect to "take a wife" if not a mistress.
    – Stuart F
    Commented Oct 21 at 14:46
  • She 'almost' wishes he currently had a mistress, having 'taken' her (begun the relationship) in the past.
    – Kate Bunting
    Commented Oct 21 at 14:56

2 Answers 2

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She is exaggerating. It's an idiom. For dramatic effect she is saying, "I might cope with this better if it were a different problem", and she chooses the extreme example of adultery.

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OP query about a dialogue from the movie "The gift of love."

I almost wish you'd taken a mistress.

The wife's statement, "I almost wish you'd taken a mistress," is an expression of extreme frustration and desperation regarding her husband's long working hours.
This sentence uses the past perfect tense ("I almost wish + had taken") to create a hypothetical situation, not describing a past event.

She's saying that if her husband had taken a mistress, at least she'd know how to address the issue (confront the mistress), whereas his long working hours leave her feeling helpless and ignored."

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