Under the Sand

I just saw this on DVD and here's a mini review. To read more, click here. A middle aged couple drive to southwestern France on vacation. One morning they decide to go to the beach. The husband tells his wife that he's going to go swimming. When the wife wakes from her nap her husband has disappeared. From an opening that references L'Avventura (Antonioni, 1960), Ozon sidesteps the existential rumination of that film, instead focusing on the psyche of his main character. The spectre of her husband haunts her as she attempts to cope with his absence and understand what his absence signifies about their past. Charlotte Rampling's fascinating portrayal of the wife who knows her husband is gone but refuses to wholly give up hope drives the film, and Antoine Heberle and Jeanne Lapoirie's cinematography charts her journey, from bright color, to more and more desaturated tones as the film progresses. A beautiful portrait, carefully observed, and finely nuanced.