A PRIVATE LIFE
(director/writer: Rebecca Ziotowski; screenwriter: Anne Berest, Gaelle Mace; cinematographer: George Lechaptois; editor: Geraldine Mangenot; music: Robin Coudert; cast: Jodie Foster (Lilian Steiner), Daniel Au teuil (Gabriel Haddad), Noam Morgensziem (Pierre Hallan, smoking patient), Virginie Efira (Paula Cohen-Solai),Mathieu Amalric (Simon Cohen-Solai), Vincent Lacoste (Julien Haddad-Park), Luàna Bajrami (Valerie Cohen-Solai), Sophie Guillemin (Jessica Grange), Frederick Wiseman (Dr. Goldstein, Lilian’s mentor), Aurore Clement (Pearl Friedman), Irène Jacob (Vera), Ji-Min Park (Vanessa Haddad-Park), Jean Chevalier (Cameron); Runtime: 103; MPAA Rating: R; producer: Frederic Jouve; Sony Picture Classics, Velvet Films; 2026-France-French, English, with English subtitles)
“Absurd but captivating caper.”
Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz
A dark comedy framed as if a mystery thriller. It’s directed and written by French filmmaker Rebecca Zlotowski (“An Easy Girl”/”Other People’s Children”), who co-writes this absurd but captivating caper with Anne Berest and Gaelle Mace.
Lilian Steiner (Jodie Foster, the American actress, speaks a fluent French) is a successful American psychoanalyst in Paris, living there for a long time. Her life takes a turn for the worse when a musician patient named Paula (Virginie Efira) commits suicide and her orchestra conductor husband (Mathieu Amalric) suspects she was driven to suicide by Lilian prescribing the anti-depressant drugs she overdosed on. However, Lilian suspects foul play especially since she never got a hint her patient wanted to kill herself during her therapy sessions. When Paula’s daughter Valérie (Luána Bajrami) hands Lilian a note her mother wrote before her death, she’s pushed into investigating her death.
Lilian is divorced from the genial Frenchman Gabriel (Daniel Auteuil), an ophthalmologist, who still treats her weak tear-ducts that causes her to cry for no reason. They have an adult son (Vincent Lacoste) she’s estranged from, who has an infant son.
Gabriel agrees to team up with Lilian to investigate the mysterious death and clear things up for his frazzled ex.
In her search for the truth, Lilian visits a hypnotist therapist (Sophie Guillemin) to see if she’s hiding something in her unconscious about her Jewish heritage that keeps her from knowing herself better.
Foster is engaging as the classy but stiff therapist who becomes frantic because something she can’t put her finger on is bothering her. It ends on an anti-climactic note, whereby the therapist learns more about herself but without finding out the cause of her patient’s death.
It played at the Cannes Film Festival.
REVIEWED ON 1/24/2026 GRADE: B-
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