Tell No One (Ne le dis à personne) directed by Guillaume Canet based on a novel by Harlan Coben (2006)
Tell No One is is a very stylish French thriller which is well worth watching before Hollywood releases a superfluous remake.
Here is a brief spoiler free plot summary :
Alex (François Cluzet) wife Margot (Marie-José Croze) were childhood sweethearts and are now happily married. They still get gooey over a heart they carved on a tree trunk soon after their first kiss.
At the start of the movie their togetherness is signified by a bit of skinny dipping but when Margot goes for a moonlight swim things begin to go pear-shaped.
From the wood at the other side of the lake she cries for help. Alex swims to investigate and gets clubbed by a baseball bat for his trouble.
The next thing we know it is 8 years later.
We learn that he was in a coma when his wife’s dead body was identified by her father. Now Alex is a respected children’s doctor and a single man. It turns out that he was originally suspected of murdering his wife until a serial killer was imprisoned for the dastardly crime.
The fact that Jeff Buckley’s achingly sad cover version of Lilac Wine soundtracks his life show that he is still haunted by the loss.
The discovery of the bodies of two men near where Margot disappeared prompts les flics to reopen the murder file and reawakens their suspicions vis-a-vis Alex. One of the bodies was buried with a baseball bat used to hit Alex and they also find a key to Margot’s locker which contains a rifle and photos of her with a black eye and bruised body.
Meanwhile Alex starts getting e-mails with video links purporting to be form his ‘dead’ wife…………………….
A complicated series of Hitchcockian plot twists and turns ensue.
It is a bit too contrived and confusing at times and , even though it all gets tied up a little too neatly, it keeps you guessing right to the end.
This is the trailer:
