I wasn’t going to review the wonderful new French film Tell No One this week because I didn’t think it would still be playing next week. Glancing through the paper today, I was delighted to see that our good friends at the Carousel Cinemas are holding it over for one more week. I am here to tell you now to go see this movie before it is gone. Or I will find you. And slap you. And tell you not to complain about Greensboro not getting good movies because you don’t go see them anyway. Seriously.
Our story begins at a family gathering in the countryside. Dinner, drinks, Etc. It is all a set up to meet the key players in the story to come. Mainly Alex, the wonderfully understated Francois Cluzet, who will become the focal point of the story to follow. The day after the dinner, Alex and Margot make a trip to a local lake for a swim. Through a nice bit of editing, the scene is almost dialogue free, we come to see that this is a special place for them. In fact, we come to see that this is the place they met and fell in love when they were just children. They visit a tree where they carved their names as kids, then they go skinny-dipping. In the still of the night, laying on a dock in the middle of the lake, they have a fight. One of those petty little fights that they would almost immediately have gotten over. Except that Margot swims to shore angrily. Moments later a noise is heard…then a scream. Alex swims to shore to help, but is immediately knocked unconscious and thrown back into the water.
Eight years after his wife’s brutal murder we catch up with Alex. On the surface, he seems ok, but clearly there is a lot boiling underneath. Cleared of all charges, he was the prime suspect in the murder until a famous serial killer was finally convicted of the crime, he has not gotten over the events of that night at the lake, and doesn’t appear to want to. He goes to work at the hospital, he’s a pediatrician, lives quietly alone, and maybe drinks a little too much. Then one day, the police discover two bodies very near the site where his wife’s body was found. The police come knocking, and once again, Alex is a suspect in his wife’s murder. The story is all over the press, and then he receives an anonymous email with some very personal information, prompting him to begin questioning the things that he has known to be true for the last eight years. The events that follow are the meat of this story. Lies are truths, truths are lies and the only people Alex can trust are a low-life gangster, a startling Gilles Lellouche, who’s son he once helped; and his sister’s wife, the always brilliant Kristin Scott Thomas. I won’t go into any more plot details as I feel like giving you any information might ruin some of the surprises…and there are plenty. Though I will tell you that there is a sequence that involves Alex being abducted and held in the back of a van that I would put up against any scene from a thriller in the past 20 years. I admire a film that can catch me completely off guard, and this one did it a couple of times.
The fun with movies like this is discovery. We are told only what we need to know in any moment, and every time Alex discovers some new bit of information we get a rush of adrenaline like we are right there with him, and that is the beauty of this film. Cleverly directed by actor Guillaume Canet, if you saw Love Me If You Dare a few years back he was the male lead, Tell No One never misses a beat. The action is sharp, a wonderful cast of actors all deliver fine performances, and I doubt you will see a more skillfully edited and evenly paced film all year. Though it may be about five minutes too long, and I sort of did not like the final scene. It’s a little anti-climactic and definitely a bit melodramatic, but that’s ok. The best part of movies like this is getting there, and that’s where this one works best.
I was surprised to find that this film is based on an American novel. It felt so authentic that I would never have guessed anything but French origin for the story. Oh well. I guess a good story knows no language. That being said, this would have been a very annoyingly average thriller if it had been made in Hollywood. I feel like I should tell you more, but I don’t want to take the piss out of the whole thing. Go see this movie. If you find yourself at the box-office wondering is you should bother with the new Saw film or Angelina Jolie in Changeling, I would say don’t bother with either. Go see Tell No One. And then tell someone. And do it before Friday.
