Stranger by the Lake

A French film that takes place in a single location. There is a lake. The car park at its edge, the beach and the wood behind it are a place where men meet, and the film never leaves it. Franck comes every day. He swims, sits, talks, and goes when evening comes. Henri is a man who sits apart. He has nothing with anyone and comes only to talk, and the two become friends. Then Michel appears. Franck likes him but the man already has someone. One evening Franck watches from the wood. Michel drowns the man in the water and Franck sees it. He tells nobody. The next day he comes back to the lake and starts seeing Michel. From there the film moves in the shadow of an investigation. A body is found, an inspector arrives, and questions begin. What the narrative is interested in is not murder but desire: the film does not explain why Franck stays; it builds danger as an attraction rather than a reason. The form is strict. There is no music at all, the camera looks from the same three or four positions, and the days repeat in the same order: a car arriving at the car park, the beach, the water, the wood. Sex is shown openly and the film does not try to hide it. The director was named best director in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes. Pierre Deladonchamps, Christophe Paou and Patrick d'Assumçao are in the cast. Alain Guiraudie wrote and directed. Who it is for: anyone who likes patient, formally strict, uncomfortable thrillers. Who it is not for: anyone who avoids explicit sex, and anyone looking for pace in a plot.