I had for the longest time contemplated to see this film but finally somehow ended up renting the DVD. I must say, I was a bit bored at the pace the movie was going and felt it could have had a different outcome to make it alot more “let’s make sense of all this” type movie.
Don’t get me wrong, the movie was beautifully filmed, wonderfully scripted and Kristin Scott Thomas was most amazing and her performance was definitely Oscar worthy. But the movie lacked a stronger storyline in my opinion. I understand Phillipe Claudel’s attempt at showing us one woman’s struggle with integrating back into society after being imprisoned for murdering her child, but the pace was so slow that it almost felt like Claudel needed to drag the story so that it did not fall into the short-film category.
Often times I kept predicting various plots in my head in order to force myself to watch the movie until the end but to my disappointment it ended bleak and I was left with an empty feeling in my stomach. I also had a difficult time relating to Juliette’s sister Lea (Elsa Zylberstein) because in my opinion, her role wasn’t strong enough to encompass Juliette’s life, her story simply ran parallel to Juliette’s and it seemed not to get anywhere relevant. Again I was expecting her to leave her husband or have an affair or go crazy but that never happened, it just kept going into nothingness.
Too many mysteries in my opinion, many mislead scenes and a story not to be watched passed your bedtime. I think its ok to skip this movie but if you are trying to brush up on your French then by all means rent it.
B-lot buzz 
I liked the bleakness of this film and while it was by mo means an easy watch I was glad it ended the way it did. Scott Thomas is great and other than Jodie Foster I can't think of two many English or American actors that could have done such a great job in French.
I think I would have preferred her sister accidentally killing her son and she taking the blame for it. And since the sister couldn't remember their childhood well, their reunion would unfold the circumstances, leading Lea to remember what she had done. Bleak was good, no doubt, story could have been better.