Swimming Pool

Charlotte Rampling's emotionally repressed crime writer and publisher Charles Dance's carefree daughter, Ludivine Sagnier, encounter each other in France when Rampling takes a working break to gain inspiration for her next book in this teasingly ambiguous study of creative angst and sexual tension. Director François Ozon continues to pry into the psyche of the vulnerable, while Yorick Le Saux's cinematography is key to establishing the contrast between the drab frustration of London and the scorching temptation of the southern French hideaway of Luberon. This in turn serves to reinforce the differences between the two women. But it's the skill with which Ozon and his stars explore clashing attitudes and universal urges that ensures this knowing melodrama is compelling viewing right up to its mischievous conclusion.

Bored by her successful series of crime mysteries, uptight British novelist Rampling agrees to take a break in her... read more on Time Out