Rent A Heart in Winter (1992)

Convincing - A Heart in Winter review by Swambi

This is a deceptively simple film, well acted and very believable. There is virtually no "action" but the undertatement of the characters, and the growing emotional involvement made it compelling viewing for me.

Fire and ice - A Heart in Winter review by SB

Set in the world of violin playing and repair, a woman conducting a relationship with a suitable man finds herself impelled to pursue an unsuitable man, who is the work partner of the first man. Like so many women before her, she believes that the unsuitable man can change if she loves him enough. Nothing very dramatic happens but the film is very clear and true in its exposition of feelings. Emmanuelle Beart is convincing as a beautiful, intelligent woman who hopes but does not understand.

Music Lovers - A Heart in Winter review by Steve

This was once my idea of a quintessential French film; a chilly, intellectual analysis of a love triangle between members of an elite which is dense with elliptical talk about feelings and philosophical abstractions; where the woman is extremely gorgeous but the men more what is best described as characterful.

Though that also sounds like Harold Pinter... A talented classical violinist who specialises in Ravel is about to move into an apartment with a married man but then falls in love with his partner in the business of repairing string instruments. So we hear some tasteful music set against their psychological anguish.

Emmanuelle Béart is the standout not only for conveying her emotional vulnerability, but also miming pretty well on the fiddle. Plus she brings her exceptional beauty. Daniel Auteuil- her then real life husband- plays a genius at evaluating the tone of a musical instrument, but a mere dilettante in the art of love.

And it is his heart which is in deep freeze. André Dussollier is the least starry of the trio as an entrepreneur whose dream second act is suddenly in doubt. Claude Sautet directs with an absence of style because it's an actors film which is a little theatrical. It's one of those French films they sadly no longer make.