It amazes me how many people seem to feel like movies should hit you over the head with their point.
I could most certainly feel an emotional connection between the characters, but it was very subtle - and this is what made the movie so great, and so unfullfilling by modern movie standards. They bonded, started to care for one another despite it being socially forbidden on many levels (age, marriages), and never allowed anything to truly come of it. Not everyone has an affair - most people act exactly as these two characters did in this situation.
Anyway, I thought it was an excellent movie and it definitely deserved all the best picture hype it got before the Oscars (although I refuse to drop my allegiance to LotR and my pleasure at it winning
)