Our film team is voting on the best 2017 movies released in theaters and VOD so far. We'll update it throughout the year. T he burning question – is Adrien telling the whole truth about himself and Frantz? Offers news, comment and features about the British arts scene with sections on books, films, music, theatre, art and architecture. Requires free registration.

Directed by François Ozon. With Pierre Niney, Paula Beer, Ernst Stötzner, Marie Gruber. In the aftermath of WWI, a young German who grieves the death of her fiancé. Tuesday night has just gotten better! Join us at the Avalon Theatre for Dinner, Shopping & A Movie starting on July 4th. Shop or dine downtown anytime on Tuesday and.

Premiering in competition at Cannes, the French auteur's L'amant double certainly won't win any prizes for taste, coherence or originality. But it's got style, sex appeal and a delicious streak of batshit crazy that this year's sleepy main slate sorely needed — think endoscopic vaginal shots, . Its reception in France's psychoanalytic and psychiatric circles may be less assured; the film is like a feature- length PSA against Gallic shrinks. The story opens with Chloe (Marine Vacth of Ozon's Young & Beautiful), a quintessential Parisian beauty of 2. Mia Farrow's Rosemary, just the first in Ozon's giddy parade of cinephilic winks and nods. We then find Chloe in a gynecologist's examining room, where the doctor tells her that the abdominal pains she's been suffering from are surely anxiety- or depression- related. Chloe asks for a psych referral: .

Cue her first appointment with Dr. Paul Meyer (Dardenne brothers regular Jeremie Renier), a blond, boyishly handsome therapist whose sweater- and- spectacles look is as reassuring as his professional manner. Chloe immediately takes to their sessions, certain moments of which Ozon presents via split- screen placing the two characters in an intimate face- to- face formation. Luckily (or dysfunctionally, depending on how you look at it), the feelings are mutual. Doctor and patient kiss, and before long Chloe and her beloved feline companion Milo are moving into Paul's apartment. Perturbed, she gently pleads with him, .

When she inquires about it that night, Paul insists it wasn't him. It doesn't take long for Chloe (whose job as a museum attendant seems to leave her a lot of free time) to track down the man she saw: Dr. Louis Delord, a psychoanalyst who happens to be Paul's estranged identical twin (also played by Renier). Chloe makes an appointment, and quickly learns that Louis is quite the opposite of Paul — as foreshadowed by the fake plant in his waiting room (unlike Paul's real one) and the chilly modern d. With his slicked- up hair, smart suits and superior semi- sneer, Louis is a Lacanian nutjob whose methods include insulting Chloe, abruptly ending their sessions after a few minutes and, most unconventionally, . But in addition to their cheekiness, the erotic scenes in L'amant double carry a genuine charge of weirdness and wildness — never more so than when Chloe fantasizes that she's having a threesome with the brothers, first as herself and then as a pair of Siamese twins (which, I suppose, would be a foursome). Making onscreen sex play like something we haven't seen a million times already is always risky (just ask Abdellatif Kechiche, the maestro behind the spank- heavy bouts of coitus in 2.

Palme d'Or winner Blue Is the Warmest Color). So: Kudos, Ozon. Chloe keeps her affair with Louis — and her knowledge of his very existence — a secret from Paul, though she tries to provoke the latter into coming clean with such leading questions as: . Biography Movies Watch A Ghost Story (2017). But its tale of doubles, deception and desire allows Ozon to fool around with some of his favorite themes — the turbulent inner lives of complex women, the distance between appearance and reality, the essential unknowability of even our most intimate loved ones, the necessity of imagination in enduring everyday life. Meanwhile, the director's supreme control is fully evident in the cool elegance of his compositions (DP Manu Dacosse does terrific work) and the tonal confidence that's sustained from start to finish. He also gets the most out of his cast: Often shot in lush close- up, Vacth conveys a captivating fragility spiked with a dash of deviousness, and she's nicely matched by Renier, who, as Louis, plays enjoyably against good- boy type. The ever- regal Bisset has fun as two different mothers, and Myriam Boyer almost walks off with the whole movie, going full camp as a kooky neighbor vying for the title of Worst Catsitter Ever.

By turns gently emotional and aggressively nerve- jangling, Philippe Rombi's score swerves and shifts almost as much as the storyline. It's the perfect accompaniment for a film that's made with serious craftsmanship but never takes itself seriously.

Production company: Mandarin Films. Cast: Marine Vacth, Jeremie Renier, Jacqueline Bisset, Myriam Boyer, Dominique Reymond. Director- writer: Francois Ozon (loosely based on the novel Lives of the Twins by Joyce Carol Oates)Producers: Eric and Nicolas Altmayer. Director of photography: Manu Dacosse. Production designer: Sylvie Olive. Editor: Laure Gardette.

Costume designer: Pascaline Chavanne. Music: Philippe Rombi.

Casting: Sarah Teper, Leila Fournier, Anais Duran. Venue: Cannes Film Festival (Competition)1. How To Watch Lights Out (2016) Online here.