LE RANG DU LION

After meeting about a month ago, Alex and Jade fall for each other hard. When she invites him to join her in the country with some friends, including her cousin Oliver, he leaps at the chance. But what Jade has failed to make clear is that they will be sharing with other young guests who are all members of a commune led by Gabriel, a former college professor obsessed with Nietzsche. Alex, who has been soul-searching since he quit studying economics, soon realizes that Gabriel is a bona fide guru who has turned his magnificent house into what he calls a “laboratory of the real,” where pretence, prejudice, taboos and morality are banned. Shot independently in the West Bolton region, whose impressive landscapes serve as counterpoint to the disturbing games of manipulation, domination and psychological submission, this first feature by Stéphan Beaudoin is underpinned by the presence, spontaneity and energy of his young cast, including Sébastien Delorme and Frédéric Lemay, whose perverse one-on-one encounter is as unsettling as it is fascinating.