Working from a script by Henri-Georges Clouzot (of Les Diaboliques fame), Claude Chabrol indulges his passion for Hitchcockian mischief in this story of a country hotelier whose inability to accept his wife's love tips him into insane jealousy.
Chabrol exploits Emmanuelle Beart's radiant sensuality as shrewdly as he manipulates Francois Cluzet's self-lacerating suspicion. But his cunning concealment of the truth can't disguise the melodramatic nature and psychological shallowness of this otherwise polished diversion.