Grand Central

A nuclear power station might seem an unlikely setting for an erotically charged drama but in French writer/director Rebecca Zlotowski's flamboyant second feature it adds further jeopardy to an already dangerous liaison, while the plant's working practices have a comparably dubious morality. A Prophet's Tahar Rahim is the restless protagonist, joining a transient band of subcontractors who - fuelled by the need to trust one's co-workers in this most hazardous of environments - have fused to form an unconventional family. He's befriended by an imposing but avuncular veteran (the Robert Mitchum-esque Denis Ménochet) before becoming passionately entangled with the man's fiancée (Léa Seydoux). The lovers hardly speak, with the kinetic camerawork and expressive, avant-garde score communicating their heightened emotions and animal attraction. Rahim makes for a complex, convincing lead yet Seydoux remains a strutting, pouting enigma. At the helm Zlotowski takes admirable risks, and the result is a flawed, provocative curio.