L'Inconnu Du Lac (aka Stranger By The Lake) (2013)

Set entirely on a lake where gay men sunbathe and cruise and have sex in the adjoining woods, a young man (Pierre De Ladonchamps) becomes obsessed with a handsome stranger (Christophe Paou) and is determined to get him. When he sees the stranger murder his most recent lover late at night by the lake, he is disturbed but his ardor is not dampened. This is a dangerous game he will see to the very end. Nominated this week for eight Cesar awards (France's Oscar) and winner of a best director award at this year's Cannes film festival, the film is as sexually explicit as BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR (15 minutes into the film, the two blue haired ladies behind me gasped and dashed out of the theater). This is a compelling yet unsettling piece of cinema. The director Alain Guiraudie is fastidious in the specificity of his narrative; nothing is wasted, not a shot, not a look, not a word. It's almost as if Hitchcock had directed a gay porn film. It's even unclear who the stranger by the lake is. It would seem to refer to the killer but the film features a wonderful performance by Patrick D'Assumcao as an overweight heterosexual man who comes to the lake to sit in the sun away from everybody and just watch. The stranger of the title could just as well refer to him. There were some audible groans as the film faded to black because its story was unresolved. Personally, I was relieved ... I didn't want to know.