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Poster for The Color of Lies

The Color of Lies

1999 · 113 min

A quiet, unsettling plunge into suspicion and gossip, where everyday provincial life curdles into quiet menace.

Overview
In a small Breton town, a 10-year-old girl is found murdered. René, her art teacher, a professional painter, is the last person to have seen her alive. The inspector in charge of the investigation immediately questions him. In this small provincial town where people all know each other and regularly meet at the Bar des Amis, René is increasingly unsettled by the other inhabitants' suspicions and by the inspector's investigation. Children stop coming to him for lessons. His wife, Viviane, a district nurse, protects him and supports him with her love. However, a self-centred media-star writer adds to René's confusion...

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How it feels

Written by AI. It can be wrong.

Tone
  • darkstrength 2 of 3
  • tensestrength 2 of 3
  • melancholicstrength 2 of 3
  • cynicalstrength 1 of 3
Pacing
slow-burn, 1 of 4, from slow-burn to relentless
Attention
engaged, 3 of 4, from background-friendly to demanding
Themes
  • isolation
  • deception
  • guilt
  • media
  • morality
Places
  • small town
Era
contemporary
Audience
adult
Form
  • ensemble
Content intensity
  • Gore mild
  • Language mild
  • Violence mild
  • Sex mild
All scales, 0 to 10
Scales, 0 to 10
ScaleValue0 to 10
Action2
Horror3
Humour2
Realism8
Romance3
Tension7
Darkness7
Complexity7
Emotional weight7

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Where to watch in the UK

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Streaming data from JustWatch.All options on TMDB

Details

Genres
crime, drama
Directed by
Claude Chabrol
Written by
Odile Barski, Claude Chabrol
Starring
Sandrine Bonnaire, Jacques Gamblin, Antoine de Caunes, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Bernard Verley, Bulle Ogier, Pierre Martot, Noël Simsolo
Music
Matthieu Chabrol
Cinematography
Eduardo Serra
Runtime
113 min
Country
France
Languages
French

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