The frayed edges of a failed marriage are the backdrop to this acutely observed but wrenching drama. Bérénice Bejo and Cédric Kahn play a couple who built a home together, only to find themselves battling for territory over everything from access to their twin daughters to the contents of the cheese plate at the world’s most scaldingly uncomfortable dinner party.
The hand-held camera that prowls the contested space the couple still, for the moment, share gives a sense of the walls closing in. The dialogue is biting, but it’s in the body language that the recriminations play out most expressively: Bejo’s dismissive eye-roll undermines her husband’s status; Kahn, all elbows and shoulders, encroaches on her space. This is a superbly acted, unapologetically adult exploration of a relationship atrophied.
