This is a tour de force for Charlotte Rampling - her performance alone makes this worth watching.
Things begin with Marie (Rampling) and her husband Jean (Bruno Cremer) heading out of Paris to their summer home in the country. In following the mundane activities of their trip and first night away we learn quite a bit about them. The rhythms of their married life have long since been grooved. Marie's attachment to Jean is apparent, but Jean's feelings for Marie are less well established and this becomes a relevant plot element.
On the day after their arrival at the summer home the couple go to the beach. While Marie suns herself, Jean goes for a swim and he does not come back. Marie goes through all of the expected reactions - waiting anxiously, calling the police, witnessing the search, and finally giving up. It is here that we move into the deeper waters of the story, as it were. The expressions on Jean's face just prior to his going on the swim sets the tone of ambiguity as to the cause of his vanishing. Was his disappearance an accident, suicide, or willful?
Marie deals with this bewildering situation by entering into a state of denial and this is where Rampling and Ozon boost this movie beyond the ordinary as they subtly trace the gradual chipping away of Marie's illusions. The reaction shots of Marie's seeing an older man swimming in a pool, or receiving a recorded message that a body has been found, are powerful in their understatement. The use of lighting to accentuate Marie's moods is quite effective, like the use of harsh white light when she is in obvious agony.
Rampling is at the top of her form and she completely puts to rest any idea that a woman in her 50s cannot be sexy.
The subtext of how Marie's friends try to deal with her reactions is engaging, making you wonder about the best way to deal with a friend in a state of denial. You want to be supportive, but also want to encourage them to face what you think are the realities of the situation.
Relationships are always more complicated than the participants understand and, as is the case here, a traumatic event can unleash emotions and thoughts previously unexplored. I took the ambiguous ending to personify the hopes, fears, and unknowables in Marie's relationship with Jean, and maybe in all significant relationships.
Things begin with Marie (Rampling) and her husband Jean (Bruno Cremer) heading out of Paris to their summer home in the country. In following the mundane activities of their trip and first night away we learn quite a bit about them. The rhythms of their married life have long since been grooved. Marie's attachment to Jean is apparent, but Jean's feelings for Marie are less well established and this becomes a relevant plot element.
On the day after their arrival at the summer home the couple go to the beach. While Marie suns herself, Jean goes for a swim and he does not come back. Marie goes through all of the expected reactions - waiting anxiously, calling the police, witnessing the search, and finally giving up. It is here that we move into the deeper waters of the story, as it were. The expressions on Jean's face just prior to his going on the swim sets the tone of ambiguity as to the cause of his vanishing. Was his disappearance an accident, suicide, or willful?
Marie deals with this bewildering situation by entering into a state of denial and this is where Rampling and Ozon boost this movie beyond the ordinary as they subtly trace the gradual chipping away of Marie's illusions. The reaction shots of Marie's seeing an older man swimming in a pool, or receiving a recorded message that a body has been found, are powerful in their understatement. The use of lighting to accentuate Marie's moods is quite effective, like the use of harsh white light when she is in obvious agony.
Rampling is at the top of her form and she completely puts to rest any idea that a woman in her 50s cannot be sexy.
The subtext of how Marie's friends try to deal with her reactions is engaging, making you wonder about the best way to deal with a friend in a state of denial. You want to be supportive, but also want to encourage them to face what you think are the realities of the situation.
Relationships are always more complicated than the participants understand and, as is the case here, a traumatic event can unleash emotions and thoughts previously unexplored. I took the ambiguous ending to personify the hopes, fears, and unknowables in Marie's relationship with Jean, and maybe in all significant relationships.