Alice & Martin

Andre Techine's sprawling, emotional love story is the kind of movie that makes you work a little. It takes time to figure out the relationships between the characters, to say nothing of their motives and feelings. But like so many of Mr. Techine's movies, 'Alice et Martin' repays the effort. The unlikely, complicated passion between Martin, the troubled illegitimate son of a wealthy industrialist, and Alice, a brittle violinist, unfolds against an equally complicated and sometimes overcrowded background of family secrets and shifting domestic alliances. Juliet Binoche and Alexis Loret are superb in the title roles. (official distributor synopsis)