So much of what happens in Gilles' Wife happens inside the characters' heads that without the incredibly expressive face of star Emmanuelle Devos, it might be hard to follow the plot of the film. Even with Devos—whose every smile, look and nod is a near-revelation into the inner life of her character—the film is more than a little obtuse. Director and co-writer Frédéric Fonteyne unfolds his story at a studied, deliberate pace, introducing us to factory worker Gilles (Clovis Cornillac) and his wife, Elisa (Devos), who live modestly with their twin daughters in a small French town in the 1930s. At first, their life seems idyllic, but soon Elisa begins to see signs that Gilles is having an affair with her sister, Victorine (Laura Smet).
Since the movie is called Gilles' Wife and not Gilles' Mistress, we don't see what's going on between Gilles and Victorine, and since Elisa is taciturn and timid, we're not really sure how much she knows or what she plans to do about it. Eventually she confronts Gilles, but things don't turn out how you might expect. Throughout the film, Fonteyne reveals only as much as Elisa has learned herself, expertly putting the audience in her position as she suffers silently, doing laundry, caring for her children and hungering for each scrap of affection from her husband even as she becomes more certain that he's in love with someone else.
While Devos provides a striking depth of emotion as Elisa, her skills aren't quite enough to keep the movie from feeling cold and distant. Cinematographer Virginie Saint-Martin captures the quaint town in beautifully muted grays and browns, and the costume design and art direction create a lovely and understated sense of time and place. But the story, for the most part, could be set in any period, and the consequence of the extreme focus on Elisa is that we don't get any sense of the other characters' inner lives. Why are Gilles and Victorine having an affair? Who knows.
Even if the plot is consistently underwhelming, all of the performances are effective and Fonteyne manages to create several scenes of heartbreaking emotion. You may not quite understand why Elisa does what she does at the end of the film, but Devos' haunted eyes and enigmatic smile are enough to give you a pretty good idea.