Kein Sterbenswort (2006)

Kein Sterbenswort: Directed by Guillaume Canet. With François Cluzet, Marie-Josée Croze, André Dussollier, Kristin Scott Thomas. An accidental discovery near a doctor’s estate stirs up some painful memories eight years after his wife’s hideous murder, and now, things are bound to take a turn for the unexpected. Does the good doctor know more than he’s letting on?

“Tell No-one is the debut feature from Guillaume Canet, a guy arguably best known outside of France for being that bloke in The Beach who shouts u0026quot;Francoise!u0026quot; a lot. While he may not have seemed to be up to much then, judging from this stunning adaptation of Harlan Cobenu0026#39;s novel of the same name, he certainly is now.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eTell No-one is the story of Dr. Alexander Beck, a man who gets an email from his wife. Boring, you say? Becku0026#39;s wife was killed eight years ago in an attack that left him (in a sense) lucky to be alive. The email instructs him to u0026quot;tell no-oneu0026quot; and with nobody to turn to, Beck throws himself into a desperate search for the woman he loved and lost.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eWhat follows is arguably a typical array of thriller conventions: the secrets, the lies, and the inevitable betrayals, but what sets this movie apart is its pacing. Canet sheds some of Cobenu0026#39;s superfluous subplots which ramps the tempo up so effectively that you soon forget that itu0026#39;s all in French. The move from the States to France also works in its favour, especially for foreign markets (as in the UK u0026amp; US), as it makes the movie feel edgier and more unfamiliar than a standard American cop-chase movie. The combination of these factors give Tell No-one a freshness and intelligence that a lot of modern thrillers are lacking.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe quality of the acting (especially from Cluzet) and the dialogue, no doubt helped by Cobenu0026#39;s writing, keeps the story believable as everyman Beck races ever closer to the truth, and to round it off, the score is great too, with clever use of familiar tracks to help keep the audience somewhat comfortable as Becku0026#39;s search becomes more and more dangerous.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eTell No-one may sound like another average thriller, but its pacing and finesse place it head and shoulders above the rest of the crowd.”