Hideaway

François Ozon's Hideaway opens with a well-to-do couple, Mousse and Louis (Isabelle Carré, Melvil Poupaud), shooting heroin in a Parisian flat. When Louis succumbs to an overdose, Mousse discovers she's pregnant, and while Louis' mother (Claire Vernet)--fearing Mousse will be an unfit parent--recommends an abortion, the prickly and defiant Mousse decides otherwise, retreating to a beach house owned by a friend. Undergoing methadone treatment there, Mousse is later joined by Louis' gay younger brother, Paul (Louis-Ronan Choisy), whose company Mousse enjoys until he meets Serge (Pierre Louis-Calixte), which makes her jealous (possibly because she no longer has his undivided attention, some of which is motivated by his fascination with the unborn life growing inside her belly). Many questions remain unanswered in Hideaway (although at one point Paul does disclose a secret that illuminates the connection he feels to Mousse), but Ozon ultimately trusts the viewer to look beneath the deceptively simple conversations and mundane activities to see the characters' complexities. Recommended. (K. Fennessy)