A Tout de Suite (2005)

... a painful and poignant film at once empathetic and critical, more soberly unnerving than exciting, but never less than compelling.

Opaque stares and pregnant pauses can only pull so much weight, no matter how snazzy the packaging.

A Tout de Suite is a sometimes-interesting film, particularly its first 30 minutes, but runs on long after the intrigue ends...

Benoit Jacquot's drama creates a sense of dislocation with its impossible-to- predict-what-will- happen-next plot, jumpy black-and-white cinematography, elusive characters and casual approach to the time in which it's set.

Thoroughly assured as a piece of art, and bears rewards worth enduring stretches of palled uneventfulness.

Jacquot has really excelled at recreating another era - the movie feels like a lost New Wave film just coming to light.

Whether focused on Lili's face or standing back to take in her long limbs, Caroline Champetier's enthralling black-and-white camerawork is at once nimble and evocative.