User reviews

I disagree with a few comments below: first, I believe it 'is' appropriate to switch back and forth between French and English because the character is an english literature professor in Paris and has bilingual friends; second, I feel it is unfair of anyone to characterize the main character as elderly, she is sensual, attractive, and tentatively has a good life to live in her future. I think the loss to the woman of her husband is like suddenly confronting the loss of the last 25 years of her life. To be able to cope with this changed reality she must cautiously explore a new experience; she is afraid to let go of her past and afraid to take hold of a future. I believe at the end of the movie we are shown that she will continue to refuse to relinquish the past, yet, invariably, it is shown to her that she must go on, embracing the present, as must we all.

Many film fans run screaming for the door when confronted with French film drama. It is true: a lot of them tend to be over-talkative and self indulgent. François Ozon's Sous le sable is a worthy exception. Carried almost entirely by Charlotte Rampling, this story of a woman unable to face the loss of her husband marks the return to form of a great actress. Through her sensitive handling of her character one tends to forget the effort that must have gone into depicting an intelligent woman slowly going to pieces. Ozon managed to capture the special sensuality of an older woman especially well in the erotic scenes; imagined or otherwise. It is not an easy film to watch, the subject matter too painful, but its unflinching honesty coupled with Ramplings moving performance make it more than worth-while.

Under the Sand (2000)

The plot is simple, almost too simple, and because very little happens, it depends on mood and deeply serious thinking about death to survive. And on Charlotte Rampling to have the nuance and range to pull it off.

And it works, overall, because of just those two things: heavy subject and Rampling. There are issues (and tricks, cinematically) with ghosts and memories, but these play small against the bigger strain of the lead woman dealing with this sudden trauma in her life. Even though the main event in the movie happens at the start, I don't dare mention it because its surprise is important (I didn't know it was coming, and liked the way it was handled very much).

Director Francois Ozon never seems to quite nail down the pace and editing of his films, at least for American sensibilities. Even the sensationally complex Swimming Pool doesn't quite use its material to propel us in every scene. But let's turn that on its head and say that Ozon uses emptiness and gaps in the action to give his movies breathing room, or maybe, in some old fashioned sense, the make them serious. When nothing is "happening" you can only start to think and dwell on the events, along with the characters. In Under the Sand there is nothing else to do and yet it's exactly what Rampling in her role has to do: think and dwell. It's slow at times, yes, but only if you don't let yourself relax and get absorbed.

And, like the character, confuse what is real from what is chimera, and what she needs with what she once had, and even one man from another. Even her fluid bi-lingual abilities add to the duality. By the time you get to the final scene you are left wondering what true love really is, and whether it's worth it. Because maybe it is. She has something most people do not, and it seems like a sickness and a gift at once.

The French movie Under the Sand (2000) was written and directed by François Ozon.

It stars Charlotte Rampling as Marie Drillon, a loving wife whose husband disappears from the beach, and her life, suddenly and with no explanation. The remainder of the movie shows us how Marie deals with this bizarre, horrible situation. (Not well, by any definition.)

Charlotte Rampling was very beautiful, and it's obvious that director Ozon is absolutely entranced by her beauty. (At one point--in case we missed it--a saleswoman says to Marie that "the dress shows off your figure.")

For the entire movie, the camera is directed at Rampling, often with long closeups of her face. (Rampling was 54 at the time, but looked 45.) This is a film about Charlotte Rampling's beauty. Without Rampling there wouldn't be a movie.

I had mixed feelings about this film. The basic concept of a a woman forced to deal with the disappearance of the husband she loves is interesting. The way Marie copes--or doesn't cope--with the situation is also interesting.

However, I prefer a movie with more actors than just one. The film as Ozon gives it to us depends on us wanting to see Rampling--and essentially only Rampling--in every scene. If she weren't beautiful, would the movie work at all?

We saw this film on DVD, which was fine. After the opening at the beach, most of the action takes place indoors. Under the Sand has an IMDb rating of 7.1. I agree with this, and rated it 7.

Probably the best thing about director Francois Ozon's Sous le Sable (Under the Sand) is the re-emergence of sultry British actress Charlotte Rampling in the film's lead role. Having started out in the mid-60s, Rampling was beginning to appear in some rather offbeat, kinky films by the early 70s, such as the incestuous "Tis Pity She's a Whore" and the sado-masochistic "Night Porter." And though she's worked steadily since that time in various film and television roles, to my knowledge, Rampling hasn't had a lead role in a film for quite a few years. And it's good to see her in such fine form. She has always been a competent, attractive actress with an air of intrigue about her. So, here she is as Marie Drillon, a deluded widow who takes living in denial to new heights. Overwhelming evidence suggests that Marie's husband has drowned while swimming, yet she continues to speak of him as if he were alive and has conversations with him when he frequently appears in her apartment. It's a moderately interesting premise, though the pace of the film is a bit slow. As the story progresses, figuring out whether Mr. Drillon committed suicide or died accidentally becomes the focus of the plot. And for a while, it keeps you guessing by revealing small pieces of the puzzle. But the real matter at hand is Marie herself and the outcome of her delusional condition. She seems to make progress at times, especially when she starts dating a gentleman whom her best friend has recommended; yet she continues to struggle emotionally and psychologically.

Ultimately, one is most likely left with an uneasy feeling about poor Marie, and the film would have been more positive and probably stronger if her character could have fostered or conveyed a greater sense of growth. Even so, the film is above average, and Rampling turns in an excellent performance. And if nothing else, one is reminded that not all things in life can be neatly resolved or easily accepted; we choose either to grow, overcome the blows and take responsibility for the quality of our lives or we suffer the consequences.

Very often, French films go places you'd never see Hollywood go. In "Under the Sand", you have a middle-aged leading lady, a very slow and deliberate pace as well as a very vague ending...all things you'd never see in a Hollywood movie. Because of this, it's not a film for everyone...but one for folks who appreciate such things. As for me, I love French films but I found this one a bit less fulfilling than normal.

When the story begins, Jean and Marie (Charlotte Rampling) go to the beach for a vacation. While Marie is relaxing on the sand, Jean says he's going for a swim. However, when Marie later goes looking for him, he's gone. Most likely he's drowned but exactly what his fate is, the film never clearly states. Much of the film consists of showing how Marie deals with her husband's death...or, more appropriately, how she refuses to deal with it or accept it. In fact, she even pretends to herself that he's still there and talks about him as if he returned long, long ago...safe and sound.

The idea of a mentally scarred and ill woman refusing to deal with death is an interesting, though not exactly pleasant one. But for me the reason this film only gets a 6 is that too many things are left dangling late in the film...far too much. As a result, it left me feeling a bit cheated. I did NOT neat a neat Hollywood ending but all the fine acting was undone by the rather unconventional script. See the film and see what I mean. An interesting experiment but a picture I didn't love.

FYI--There's a fair amount of nudity in this one--something you might just want to be aware of if you're thinking of watching it. Interestingly, much of it is of Rampling who looks amazing for a middle-aged lady.

Though not all her films are equal, Charlotte Rampling can always be relied upon for a solid performance of controlled poise and nuance. That seems especially important here in the portrait of a woman struggling to come to terms with the disappearance of her husband, not least as there's no great dramatic push and the storytelling is kept subdued with minimal, subtle progression for the character. Rampling largely carries the picture all by herself, though this is hardly to count out her co-stars, Francois Ozon's direction, or the screenplay he conjured with Emmanuèle Bernheim. I think it's safe to say, however, that Rampling marks the chief strength of 'Sous le sable,' which speaks very well to her skills as an actor, while also reflecting on the writing that fashioned a feature so prominently centering her.

Pointedly understated and thusly focused, this comes across in some measure as a psychological drama. Such a tack requires a delicate hand to succeed, and to Ozon's credit I think it largely does. There's no singular stroke of brilliance, and at no time does the movie strike a major chord - but then, nor is it intended to, for this is a title of the much more soft and ruminative side of cinema. Ozon, Bernheim, and Rampling give us a sidelong exploration of grief, and uncertainty teetering between acceptance and denial nearly to the point of madness. That 'Sous le sable' never tips over and lends itself to emphatic profundity is a deliberate choice, and one that may come off as admirable or regrettable depending on one's perspective; in my mind, it works well for what was being crafted in this instance.

This is well made in all other regards, including costume design, hair, and makeup. I appreciate Antoine Héberlé and Jeanne Lapoirie's mindful cinematography; Philippe Rombi's original music lends to the gentle but notably pensive atmosphere across these ninety-five minutes. Given the low-key tone this won't appeal to all comers, and it's certainly suggested above all for fans of Rampling. Yet anyone who is receptive to the quietly dramatic side of the medium will find this capably engrossing and satisfying, and surely rewarding. I don't think it entirely matches my expectations only insofar as there could have been a more definite progression written for Marie, but that's just my opinion, and even at that I had enjoyed watching. 'Sous le sable' isn't necessarily something one needs to go out of their way to see, but if you do have the chance to watch, it's worth checking out.

I don't quite understand comments about the movie being slow. To me it was quite unpredictable and it maintained suspense throughout. The acting was very good and what struck me the most was how the movie was able to strike a realistic balance in everything, that was almost eerie. Indeed that is what made the movie so convincing to me. What also fascinates me is that even though the movie was realistic it was magical . I guess the real world is a magical place :-)

Bottom line: go see it!

As a film script writer and director, Ozon has evolved and matured in "The Swimming Pool" and "In the house," developing his pet themes involving sex lives and mental infirmities. But the the real value of this film will remain Ms Rampling's performance which is comparable to her turns in "The Night Porter, " "The Damned," and "Hannah." She is evidently magical whenever she works with Ozon.

A surprising change of pace for (up to that stage in his directorial career) shock auteur François Ozon in the wake of bourgeois facade-ripping as REGARDE LA MER and SITCOM, this minimalist masterpiece deals with love, loss and grief yet never becomes heavy-handed.

Middle-aged Marie (luminous Charlotte Rampling making a belated but extremely welcome return to leading roles), an English literature professor at a Parisian university, quite literally loses her husband (hauntingly sad-eyed Bruno Cremer) while on seaside holiday. She takes a nap on the beach as he's out swimming. When she wakes up, he has disappeared. Accidentally or voluntarily drowned ? Hiding perhaps from a stifling marriage ? Ozon offers no solid answers but focuses but focuses on Marie's stubborn denial of her husband's departure as she resumes her professional and social life as if nothing had happened. While those around her assume she's slipping from sanity, the truth proves considerably less tangible and far more nuanced. A tentative affair with the friend of a friend seems doomed from the start, leading to the shattering final scene, all the more heartbreaking for being open to any number of interpretations, none of them particularly cheerful.

Even though the filmmaker has reigned in his wicked humor and morality-defying shock tactics, this fortunately doesn't mean he has gone all solemn on us. The general lightness of tone might indeed startle in light of the subject matter, plus there's even an astonishingly erotic moment when Marie imagines herself being groped by both husband and lover in an elegant masturbatory fantasy. Ultimately, this is very much Rampling's show and clearly intended as such. Rarely out of frame for more than an instant here, she delivers the type of performance – both subtle and sensuous – that has been her stock in trade since she started enchanting movie audiences worldwide back in the '60s, her mysterious beauty undiminished (if anything, augmented more like) by the passing years. Contrary to her personal code of conduct (she will rarely work more than once with the same director, always looking for new experiences to further her craft and personal growth), she went on to star in Ozon's deceptively upbeat SWIMMING POOL and took a supporting role in his first failure to date, the atrocious ANGEL.

The French movie Sous le sable was shown in the U.S. with the translated title Under the Sand (2000). It was written and directed by François Ozon.

It stars Charlotte Rampling as Marie Drillon, a loving wife whose husband disappears from the beach, and from her life, suddenly and with no explanation. The remainder of the movie shows us how Marie deals with this bizarre, horrible situation. (Not well, by any definition.)

It's worth noting that Rampling is clearly fluently bilingual. In real life, she was born in England, but educated in France. I have no way of knowing whether or not she speaks French with a strong English accent. In this role, it doesn't matter, because she's English, living in France.

Charlotte Rampling was very beautiful, and it's obvious that director Ozon is absolutely entranced by her beauty. (At one point-in case we missed it-a saleswoman tells Marie that "the dress shows off your figure.") For the entire movie, the camera is directed at Rampling, often with long closeups of her face. (Rampling was 54 at the time, but looked 45.)

This is a film about Charlotte Rampling's beauty. Without Rampling there wouldn't be a movie.

I had mixed feelings about this film. The basic concept of a a woman forced to deal with the disappearance of the husband she loves is interesting. The way Marie copes-or doesn't cope-with the situation is also interesting.

However, I prefer a movie with more actors than just one. The film as Ozon gives it to us depends on us wanting to see Rampling-and essentially only Rampling-in every scene. If she weren't beautiful, would the movie work at all?

We saw this film on DVD, which was fine. After the opening at the beach, most of the action takes place indoors. Under the Sand has an IMDb rating of 7.1. I agree with this, and rated it 7.

Simple story: Husband goes missing after a swim on holiday and his wife is in denial about the situation. The idea here is to tell the story by showing only the outward reactions of all involved. Ozon hereby creates a mystery (is he really dead?, was it a suicide?) but the over-explanatory character spoils all the fun. The walk in the woods, his face before the swim already tell everything, but if that's not enough Virgina Woolf is thrown in (if you dislike reading check out The Hours).

So the rest of the movie we rely on the acting, which is average but not that interesting. We have the almost obligatory love scenes, redundant fantasies and much talk about nothing. Everything is mildly interesting. But one scene stands out: that between Suzanne (Andrée Tainsy, who just passed away) and Marie (Rampling). Andrée Tainsy mixes so many facial emotions in that scene it makes the whole movie worth watching.

Ozon is a very traditional filmmaker who seems to strike a chord with his French audience. But he could have lived thirty years ago and made the same movie. It's almost as if he is in denial of the great French film history. Luckily we still have Jeunet, Besson and a lot of new talent to save the day for the French.

Charlotte Rampling's marvellously judged performance as an Englishwoman whose French husband disappears whilst swimming is quite simply excellent. This is a perfect vehicle for Rampling as she is now, a beautiful mature woman who just oozes class. Without histrionics, she conveys the total sense of desperation at the loss of her husband, something which she will obviously never come to terms with. In terms of plot, this film is quite thin, but it is well worth watching for the central performance, which is thoroughly moving. Could be very bleak and depressing as a subject, but actually isn't at all. The time passed very quickly - my ultimate test of a good film!

Unlike the vast majority of the rest of talented French director Francois Ozon's films, Under the Sand features hardly a shocking moment. In fact, the most shocking thing about this movie is the level of restraint present towards the end when Ozon has a clear shot at giving his audience something to go home with, but doesn't capitalise on it. On the whole, Under the Sand is simply a sombre tale of love, fused with tragedy and the implications of loss. The film follows Marie Drillon (Charlotte Rampling), a woman who loses her husband while on holiday. As he has been lost in the sea, Marie has no body to prove that her husband is indeed dead, and so continues her life pretending that he's still around. The film then follows a psychological thriller structure, as we watch our protagonist disintegrate as a result of her loss. Under the Sand is more than just another thriller, however, as Francois Ozon directs it, and his energy and invention always ensure that the film remains interesting.

It's amazing just how relaxed this film is, as just shortly before seeing it I was lucky enough to catch Ozon's "Water Drops on Burning Rocks", and said film is a completely different kettle of fish to this one. There's next to no startling imagery, no impromptu dance sequences and on the whole it just seems like Ozon wanted to make a straight art film. Not that I have a problem with that. The film stars Charlotte Rampling, who would go on to collaborate with Ozon on the bewitching Swimming Pool and is an excellent actress on the whole. Ozon always ensures he gets the best out of her as well, and in this film, as in Swimming Pool, you always get the impression that the bond between actress and director is a happy one and one that both parties are satisfied with. The film's substance draws from it's themes of loss, but the most haunting element of the movie is the idea that love is ever lasting. In today's day and age it seems that it's socially acceptable to cheat on your lover, but this film ardently disagrees with that view. While I don't rate this as one of Ozon's best films, it's definitely a good one and I don't hesitate to recommend it.

"Under The Sand (Sous le sable)" is a cross between Bergman/Ullman's "Faithless (Trolösa)," for its humorless look at a middle-aged, comfortable marriage, and "Truly, Madly, Deeply" for how not to deal with an unplanned break-up.

Charlotte Rampling's face and body language are wonderfully expressive, as she alternates between facing reality and basking in fantasy, and in French and English.

While it's always interesting to be a movie tourist inside middle-class Parisian apartments, we don't really get much insight into individuals or relationships.

It's just sad.

(originally written 5/20/2001)

"Under the Sand" follows a woman who is in denial over the disappearance of her husband. Rampling delivers a splendid performance (no stretching) as the film plods along slowly lingering over the smallest details of her life revealing her desperate grief one fragment at a time while even showing her in the company of her dead husband; an apparent representation of delusion. For those interested in a microscopic examination of one woman's grief, this film may have merit. For just about everyone else, it will be too tedious and lacking in sheer entertainment value. (B)

It was wonderful to see Charlotte Rampling hosting at the closing ceremony of Cannes 2001. She looked happy and confident, absolutely capable of exchanging in French and English bilingually, and certainly no worry in looking her age at all. I remember her in "Georgy Girl" 1966 playing opposite Lynn Redgrave and Alan Bates. She was opposite Sean Connery in John Boorman's sci-fi "Zardoz" 1974.

"Sous le sable" 2000 (Under the Sand) written and directed by François Ozon (also wrote and directed "Amants criminels, Les" 1999 (Criminal Lovers*) released in U.S. 2000), is like a comeback vehicle for Rampling. The film is essentially focused on her character - a woman in her fifties losing her husband in a 25-year marriage - not being sure if he's lost or dead, or is it a matter of her not being able to accept the situation presented to her? She may be an intellectual - a professor, yet handling loss of someone close to her, she cannot handle such philosophies of life and death, or can she? Be prepared that there might not be much of a storyline should you expect dramatics. The drama is within the realms of Rampling's quiet, subtle delivery of Mrs. Marie Drillon.

If you prefer more animated or dramatic storyline about loss of a spouse, try "Truly, Madly, Deeply" 1991, directorial debut and written by ("English Patient, The" 1996) Anthony Minghella, with brilliant performances by the two leads, Alan Rickman as the (past) husband, and Juliet Stevenson as the wife (who cannot let go of her beloved husband.) From a reversed angle, there's also "To Gillian on her 37th Birthday" 1996, where Peter Gallagher is the husband (who cannot let go of his beloved wife) and Michelle Pfeiffer is the (past) wife.

* François Ozon's "Criminal Lovers" is in French. NFE: Not For Everyone. It's not your usual teenage love & adventure story about a young girl and her boyfriend, how they escaped from a murder scene into the woods and were held hostage by a woodsman… It can be viewed as a modern day dark fable perhaps. Director Ozon's psychological approaches are at work and the story is not without moral backbone.

I look forward to the release of Charlotte Rampling's two films with Stellan Skarsgård: "Signs & Wonders," and "Aberdeen."

Mental illness as a lifestyle option seems to be the theme of this work. Very potent in examining the reality and meaning of loss and acceptance (or lack thereof). The always captivating Charlotte, (great to see Dirk Bogarde's little girl all growed up) looking elegant as a woman of a certain age in a very Anglo-Parisian sheath dress-wearing kind of way, is wonderful in her ability to convey contained confusion struggling to make sense of a pain too great to bear. Also noteworthy, stylistically, is a rare instance of unease being effectively evoked in spite of sunlit sets and daytime outdoor shots. No doom and gloom here, she gets to suffer in the light of day. A film that will remain with the moviegoer long after viewing because of its painful emotions and its visually powerful final shot.

'Sous le Sable' may seem a million miles from Ozon's last film, his wonderful adaptation of Fassbinder's play 'Water Drops on burning rocks'. Where Fassbinder's world is constricted and claustrophobic, Ozon here charts a wide terrain: cities, beaches, the French countryside, graveyards, apartments, restaurants.

But Ozon has learnt some lessons from his master, most obviously in his way of filming highly emotional subject matter unemotionally The story of a woman who has lost her husband has lachrymose pitfalls enough, never mind a husband whose disappearance, Reggie Perrin-like, is unexplained. Ozon avoids the potential melodrama of grief, but it would be wrong to suggest his film is a clinical study. In the same way Fassbinder displaced character emotion smothered by social convention or posing onto his decor and his narrative form, so Ozon allows the uncertainties provoked by grief to shape his uncertain narrative.

For instance, a more objective film would have drawn a clearer line between Marie's (willed?) illusions and the reality of her loss. And there does seem to be that clear line - we can tell that her conversations with Jean are the product of her imagination, especially when her friends roll their eyeballs and suggest she visit a psychiatrist (this has led some misguided critics to label the film 'misogynist' - after all, everyone deals with inexplicable loss with exemplary sanity). But this would suggest that there is another world outside Marie's fantasies that is somehow real.

It doesn't quite work like that - the sense of time, for instance, seems to collapse into a temporal limbo: after the disappearance, we have no idea how much time has elapsed between the events shown, especially when some scenes are sharply cut short, and others almost intolerably drawn out. The book Marie is reading to her students is Virginia Woolf's Proust-inspired 'The Waves', a novel on one level about being submerged by memories and the past; there are many shots of Marie behind aquariums, or liquidy windows that suggest she too is drowning in some sort of deluge of memory.

Indeed, the repeated shots of Marie behind windows, the world outside projected onto her, suggest that she has left the real world, which has become dead to her, a land of shades, and has passed into a shadowy land of her own, which has the only solidity. This goes beyond a mere metaphor for grief - the way a mindset can transform reality, can turn the oppressive everyday into insubstantiality, and the transient imaginary into the true reality, is Surreal, and there is an unsettling, yet liberating surrealism about scenes like the aquarium one mentioned, or the extraordinary self-pleasuring, where Marie is caressed by disembodied hands, or the general emphasis on fetishistic detail (this is a film about the erotics of loss, about how desire always depends on an absence). After all, death, and uncertainty about death, is the supreme anti-bourgeois force, unsettling all attempts to create stable identities, properties and relationships (and therefore the equivalent to the rat in 'Sitcom').

To me, Ozon seems less interested in the processes of grief, than Marie's motivations - there are times when she seems cynically self-aware. The film overflows with reasons why Jean would disappear - health (he can barely breathe in the early scenes, painfully dragged down by his enormous weight), financial worries, maternal influence, marriage ennui (which the opening sequences oppressively seem to suggest), impotence - rather than die, but the sheer proliferation of plausibility becomes implausible - you wonder if these are elements of Maries's own self-questioning of a deeply unsatisfactory, unfulfilling marriage. Jean's disappearance allows her to play out, with his ghost and her new lover, the marriage she never had.

The pre-disappearance sequence is itself eerie - the ghostly country house, the matching reds (restaurant table; towel and swimsuit on the fatal day), the weirdly funny encounter with naturists on her first suspicions, the matching composition between the grass on the sand dunes behind, and Marie on her rug. There are times when Marie seems to age in time-lapse in front of our very eyes, phantom-like, as elusive as her husband, despite all her efforts with her body. 'Sous le sable' is certainly closer to Ozon's previous, more outre films than might first appear.

Mr. Ozon seems to understand a woman's pysche pretty well. This movie shows the impact of disappearance of a loved one suddenly & without any sense of closure. The bereaved wife, Marie (played perfectly by the gorgeous Ms. Rampling) seems to be doing alright on the surface except for a few comments at a get together which make the viewers feel that she is having a hard time talking about her husband in past tense. We are a bit alarmed but that's the extent of it. However, when she returns to her home, we realize the utter & extreme denial that fills every aspect of her life! It is horrifying & saddening. That a beautiful, intelligent woman can have such a reaction is a clear reminder to us of humanity's fragility & vulnerability when it comes to love. Losing a loved one is never easy. However, since humans are rational beings, it becomes much harder to come to terms with such a great loss in the absence of any plausible reason. So, not knowing exactly what happened to her husband was perhaps the biggest source of grief for Marie.

This is a very sincere look into the mind of a woman who seems to have lost a part of herself with the loss of her spouse. But I struggled with understanding the two men in Marie's life. Her husband's intentions were never fully revealed & I'm kind of okay with that because that's the point of the story. However, the one that I really have a problem with is Vincent. Why this charming & intelligent man got involved with Marie when she was not in a good place mentally is beyond me!

This movie has brought an epiphany to me. We must always consider the possibility that even though we may be perfectly happy & content with someone, things may not be so good for them. And when we love that someone, it may become extremely hard for us to let go or even to understand how they could be unhappy in such a fulfilling relationship. But such is human nature. Sometimes, having been in long relationships, people evolve in different directions such that one partner may be very happy with the routine stuff while the other may be getting suffocated. One man's medicine is another man's poison, after all! And so, it may happen that one fine day, our loved one may want to walk out on us & while it may hurt us, it might be their only salvation! We also need to consider the fact that some people may just be depressed & at that point, it is pretty much out of our hands. All we can do in such circumstances is to be supportive & hope for the best.

Lastly, this is one of those movies where you cannot have a spoiler in a review because the ending scene is open to everyone's personal interpretation & for that, you need to see it yourself!

I am trying to understand why people are characterizing Sous le sable as film noir. I assumed from that description that there would be some sort of shock ending, along the lines of Diabolique. But no, this is really a psychological study of a middle-aged woman coping with the disappearance and likely death of her husband.

Lots of beautiful cinematography with interesting Ozon twists.

I usually like independent films & this is my second Ozon film which have both had Charlotte Rampling in, and unfortunately they have both been disappointing. Too long takes, too much left unclear, and essentially I was bored. (And I'm French & like slow (but they need to be good) films.) The ending is annoying & left hanging. Why? Also, Charlotte, in character, is often not very likable. For example, she could have just been aloof, and not mean, to Vincent, who was just trying to be nice & helpful.

What this film does do is give one a good idea of how NOT to be in relation to death - one should remember that one's loved ones can die at any time and one needs to be ready to let them go. But our culture doesn't like to talk, or even think, about death, even though it's all around us. How many people die each day? And one needs to grieve adequately before starting any new relationship.