Bayflicks.net

There are few laughs in Claude Chabrol’s character study of a judge (Isabelle Huppert) investigating high-placed corruption as her marriage falls apart. Huppert is brilliant as a calm, cool legal avenger who truly believes she is acting out of completely altruistic motives, even as we begin to suspect that her ego has more to do with the problems than she would care to admit. But Chabrol holds his characters at arm’s length, creating a cold movie that never really draws us in.