Rust and Bone

French writer/director Jacques Audiard often finds dramatic traction among the criminal classes - most notably in the award-winning prison parable A Prophet - and in this romance, he re-examines themes of love and disability from his 2001 drama Read My Lips. Stephanie (Marion Cotillard) is invalided into social exile after a terrifyingly staged accident at the marine park where she trains killer whales and finds herself indebted and gradually attracted to Ali (Matthias Schoenaerts), a bare-knuckle fighter and reluctant single father. Adapted from short stories by Craig Davidson and shot in often blinding natural sunlight and hyper-real close-up, Rust and Bone powerfully fixates on the fallibility of flesh, exposed in frank sex, rolling surf and backstreet violence, and in Cotillard's ingeniously portrayed broken body. But two powerful performances and an excruciatingly detailed vision cannot atone for the disappointingly conventional third act, whose broad strokes obscure much artistry.