Alain Guiraudie’s Misericordia is an existential drama masquerading as a comedy masquerading as a thriller. The French director, whose best-known film Stateside remains 2014’s sunny, rambling queer mystery Stranger by the Lake, specializes in these kinds of slippery genre hybrids, movies that start off as one thing and eventually become other things, all without ever betraying their essence. Misericordia was a major critical hit in France, where it was nominated for mountains of awards and was named the best film of the year by Cahiers du Cinéma. The director’s shape-shifting narratives, forever flirting with the metaphysical, are obviously a known quantity there. It’ll be interesting to see how Misericordia plays in the U.S., where viewers don’t always enjoy having their expectations confounded.

The film begins in a somber and ominous register, as Jérémie Pastor (Félix Kysyl) returns to the small village of St. Martial where he spent his youth to attend the funeral of the baker for whom he worked and with whose family he lived. Immediately, there is tension with the baker’s son, Vincent (Jean-Baptiste Durand). He and Jérémie were once the best of friends, and perhaps even more than that; now their lives have gone in different directions, and a corrosive, inexpressible conflict seems to be brewing between them. Jérémie also grows close with Martine (Catherine Frot), Vincent’s mom, as they bond over their shared memories of the baker. We sense, again, that perhaps there was more to Jérémie’s relationship with his former boss as well. As if that weren’t enough, Jérémie seems to be quite taken with Walter (David Ayala), a portly, reclusive sad sack of a man living on the outskirts of town.

A Sirkian network of desires lurks just under the surface of the drama: Everybody seems to want somebody else. And all that sublimated desire propels the picture’s thrillerlike elements: Jérémie’s conflict with Vincent gets more dangerous, while his fascination with Walter grows. As a pure narrative, this would be mostly ridiculous, but that’s where Guiraudie’s skill as a filmmaker comes in. He and cinematographer Claire Mathon (Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Spencer) give this landscape, with its rough roads and forest canopies and dramatic cliffs, both lyrical beauty and eerie portent: Immersed in nature and removed from society, everybody’s been reduced to their base desires. As a protagonist, Jérémie also bears some similarities to Terence Stamp’s mysterious ambisexual stranger in Pier Paolo Pasolini’s classico-capitalist allegory Teorema (1968) — and just as Pasolini did, Guiraudie grasps that the more ornamentation you strip away from a tale, the purer its perversity becomes. Reason, it turns out, is the greatest luxury.

Misericordia has elements of rural noir, but it gathers both absurdity and lethality as it progresses. Guiraudie isn’t much for emotion in his actors: An unreadable person, after all, is also an unpredictable person. We start off viewing Jérémie as a victim of others’ assumptions and needs, but as he overstays his welcome in this place, his weird, stony persistence allows us to see how this man could drive everyone around him crazy. And yet, the movie doesn’t provide easy answers to any questions of motivation or morality or justice. Maybe because Guiraudie has other things on his mind. As our protagonist’s increasing desperation reaches comic proportions, we begin to realize that all along we’ve been watching a film about how to continue living in a world where our actions constantly cause misery, uncertainty, and pain.

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“Secret Mall Apartment” is a Search Engine Optimization-friendly title for a documentary that’s about a lot of things that cannot be captured in three words. Directed by Jeremy Workman, it tells the story of a group of friends from a rundown, artist-friendly neighborhood who got pushed out of their homes by gentrification and somehow ended up discovering an unoccupied, seemingly unmapped spot inside of the mall that pushed them out, then began furnishing it as a living space. The process took three years, all told, and during that entire time, they managed to avoid detection by mall security or even other patrons.

Workman has said that as he worked on this film, he “quickly learned that they created the secret apartment to make a statement against gentrification. They had lost their homes as a result of development, and this was their unique personal way to show developers that they weren’t going anywhere.”

However, as the film demonstrates, there were other elements in the mix. One was the thrill of doing a victimless, playful protest crime in plain sight of mall staff and customers who never noticed that the same eight people were hanging out in the mall constantly, rarely buying anything but food court items, and disappearing and reappearing for hours at a time without leaving the complex. The group slowly created a “normal” apartment in a concrete-walled, high-ceilinged, 750-square-foot room accessible only through crawl spaces and a tall set of metal stairs (which must’ve been hell to navigate with the dish cabinet and multiple couches that ended up in the space).

What’s most fascinating of all is that, in a roundabout way, “Secret Mall Apartment” is about artistic expression—and how artists can talk and talk and talk about why they did things, but might never really know the full story because the impulse to create comes from such deep places.

The eight artists were Michael Townsend, the ringleader; his then-girlfriend Adriana Valdez Young, Colin Bliss, James J.A. Mercer, Andrew Oesch, Greta Scheing, Jay Zhengebot, and Emily Ustach. The mall apartment wasn’t just a lark or an invasion by “squatters” (as the local newspaper called them) but an extension of what the eight were already doing in their public-facing careers.

Townsend is mainly a “tape artist” who makes art with easily removable tape meant to be observed and considered and then disappear. He is also a teacher who specializes in instructing people who don’t think of themselves as artists to do art in groups and to encourage people to feel confident in their artistic impulse even if they haven’t had formal training. Under his leadership, the group of eight traveled all over the United States and did what you might call temporary or ephemeral art, often comprised of silhouettes of people, animals, and objects made of paper tape. (You might have heard about the taped silhouettes they did on the sides of New York buildings commemorating the lives of people who died in the 9/11 attacks.)

The various works were playful, clever, gently mysterious exercises. They were meant to remind people of the interconnectedness of human experience and fleeting nature of existence; bring beauty to places that otherwise lacked beauty; stop people in their tracks and make them think about why it’s so revelatory to see art in a place where you wouldn’t normally expect to see art.

Although there are a few re-creations that are clearly identified as such (the filmmakers constructed a replica of the mall apartment and show how it was designed and built in a studio), the movie relies mostly on the incredible amount of low-resolution, early aughts video footage captured by the group. A lot of the footage is process documentation, just showing what was done and how.

But some of it captures tense or raw moments, including arguments about the long-term usefulness of continuing the project and the gap between Michael’s enthusiasm and everyone else’s, and the group’s encounter will mall security while they were truing to smuggle concrete cinder blocks in via the parking garage. (Michael has always had a talent for talking his way out of these kinds of situations, but the movie is wise to admit that this project wouldn’t lasted more than a day if the participants were Black.)

Workman and his co-editor Paul Murphy have an intuitive and very pleasing sense of structure, giving you the information you need at the point in the story where you think, “I wish they’d tell me more about that.” The sense of how to time the appearance of context and explanation in a movie a gift that can’t be taught in schools; you either have it or you don’t. There are times when one might wish they’d dug a little deeper into the personalities and relationships (seven of the eight were publicly unidentified until now). And as complexly as Michael is portrayed, there are connections between his biography and this project that you keep expecting the movie to highlight, yet it never does. (As a child, he moved eight times in his first year of life, which all by itself suggests why a man would build an entire artistic career around things that aren’t permanent.)

But these are nitpicks. This is a delightful, thought-provoking movie that’s about a lot of things at the same time. It’ll make you see the world with fresh eyes, and probably wonder why there isn’t more art in it.

Story: A fertility specialist’s life is upended when he is accused of attempted murder. The courtroom drama chronicles his journey as a pioneer in IVF treatment while simultaneously questioning whether he will emerge unscathed from the legal battle that threatens to destroy his legacy.

Review: What happens when someone revered for bringing hope to countless childless couples finds himself at the centre of a scandal? Director Vikram Bhatt’s Tumko Meri Kasam tells one such tale—of visionary IVF specialist Dr. Ajay Murdia (Anupam Kher), who faces allegations of attempted murder. The film navigates dual narratives—his groundbreaking contributions to fertility treatment and the intense courtroom battle that could unravel his life’s work.
Based on a true story, the film sets the stage for a gripping legal drama intertwined with a heartfelt love story from the outset. Rajeev Khosla (Meherrzan Mazda) accuses Dr Murdia of attempted murder, aiming to usurp his position as chairman of Indira IVF, a vast chain of fertility clinics. Running parallel to this conflict is the doctor’s early journey, where a younger Ajay (Ishwak Singh) battles scepticism and social stigma in the 1980s, a time when fertility clinics were often dismissed as ‘sex clinics.’ Facing opposition from peers and family, Ajay finds unwavering support in his wife, Indira (Adah Sharma). Together, they risk everything to revolutionise fertility treatment and bring hope to struggling couples.

While emotionally engaging, writer-director Bhatt’s storytelling wavers between poignant and dramatic. As the story shifts between romance, tragedy, and the legal battle, the ride doesn’t always feel seamless. At two hours and forty-six minutes, the narrative feels long-drawn and follows a formulaic path with songs. The courtroom sequences oscillate between sharply executed and contrived. However, the film’s emotional core remains intact, especially in moments of personal loss, where the younger Ajay and Indira’s bond is portrayed with tenderness, leaving you teary-eyed.

Anupam Kher delivers a solid performance as the steadfast and betrayed Dr Murdia, fiercely fighting for his clinic and reputation. Esha Deol brings finesse as his defence attorney, Meenakshi, though her role lacks depth beyond the courtroom exchanges. Ishwak Singh as the younger Ajay is a standout—his portrayal captures both the empathy and determination of a doctor ahead of his time. His chemistry with Adah Sharma is natural and compelling, making their love story one of the film’s strongest elements. The duo shines in both romantic and emotionally charged scenes, embodying resilience and unwavering faith in each other.

Durgesh Kumar (Bhushan from Panchayat) makes a brief yet powerful impact in a pivotal courtroom scene. Meherrzan Mazda, playing the antagonist, has a substantial role, yet his motivations feel underexplored. His resentment toward Ajay lacks the complexity needed to make him a formidable adversary.

Tumko Meri Kasam has a strong premise but uneven pacing and a lengthy runtime make it less immersive than it could have been. Still, the film is backed by emotional depth and strong performances.