Mildly depressed,cynical and burned-out author of mysteries Sarah Morton(Charlotte Rampling,seamless if unlikable here)is advised by her literary agent and lover John(Charles Dance) to spend some away time at his château in the south of France. She takes him up on it,moves in and proceeds to right away fall in love with the breathtaking scenery,the sunny,warm,quiet atmosphere of the area(contrasted by the gray,noisy and perceivably cold dank of London,shown at the beginning). Things seem nice and copascetic until John's daughter Julia(Ludvignie Sagnier,stunningly beautiful and vibrant)shows up,partying until the we hours and bringing boyfriends with her to create plenty of noise and distraction for Sarah. The two reach a truce at some point,and they both discover that they may have more in common that they either one thought.<br /><br />Director Francois Ozon steers this movie toward being more "image-heavy",meaning that the stuff we see here:the swimming pool,the interior of the house,the village,the physical appearance and demeanor of the characters,particularly SArah and Julia are all very important to how we view and understand the film. There are plenty of long,slow and silent moments where the movie is maybe testing more pedestrian audiences to see if they can hang with a film that is relatively low in action and where the suspense is mostly implied until the last quarter of the film. Its strength really IS its sensuality:not just Ms.Sagnier's sexiness,but also the feel of two people who are experiencing the same house with different attitudes and different reactions. The suspense part of this film--and I don't think I'm really giving anything away here by prefacing this--slowly builds,which may seem a little unusual for American audiences,since film here in the U.S. that are considered "Suspense" usually want to set the stage and tension as fast as possible to not lose the audience. Having said that,I'd say that I'm probably more comfortable in the latter type of film than the former,but this movie is still a nice change of pace where that's concerned.<br /><br />If the storyline or incidents in the film confuse you(or you just want to see Miss Sagnier again,and I know I did on both counts),you may need or want to give this a re-watch. This movie is definitely worth a look.