Gentle Monster is not an easy watch, and it’s not trying to be. It’s built on uncomfortable questions. How does something like this happen without you noticing? How much will people defend out of love? Crucially the question for Lucy (Léa Seydoux) being, could her child have been involved without her knowing?

The film follows Lucy, a pianist who gives up her career to move to the countryside so her husband, Phillip (Laurence Rupp), can recover from burnout. The police soon turn up, led by Elsa Kühn (Jella Haase), with a warrant to seize Phillip’s devices. Lucy soon learns he’s being investigated for distributing child abuse material (although the film thankfully never goes into detail), and the rest of the film follows her unravelling.

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The film’s smartest move is the parallel between Lucy and Kühn. She may appear completely unflinching to the events taking place at work, but at home she’s caring for her father with dementia who is causing problems for his live-in nurse. As the film progresses, both women are forced to reckon with the truth about someone they love, and their lives are pulled in completely different directions. I think that’s where the film gets the most interesting, because in asking the characters what they would do, and who they would defend, it’s also asking us as an audience where our opinions would lie. Coming away from the film, I couldn’t stop thinking about what I would do in that situation, and that’s a clear testament to the success of the strong writing and direction from Marie Kreutzer.

I thought that Seydoux in particular was fantastic, an absolute tour de force throughout. It can’t have been an easy role to play, but she navigates the difficult moments with grace, and the audience is undoubtedly on her side through the whole film. Phillip, on the other hand, is frustrating. The film cleverly shows him to be a good father in the early moments, and its slow release of information throughout leaves you second-guessing whether he’s innocent or guilty.

It’s not a film I’d have picked outside a festival, but it’s one I’m glad I saw. Seydoux is brilliant, and it leaves you with one question you can’t quite shake: would you defend your loved one if you were in that situation?

★★★★

On cinemas from November 18th / Léa Seydoux, Laurence Rupp, Jella Haase / Dir: Marie Kreutzer / Netflix / 15