Alex (Cluzet) is an unassuming paediatrician mourning the loss of his wife Margot (Croze) eight years previously.

Alex was badly beaten when Margot was abducted and later found dead and surrounded by slain animals - the MO of a notorious serial killer.

The culprit caught, the case was seemingly solved, but the discovery of two bodies on Alex’s land, one with a key unlocking a safety deposit box belonging to Margot, re-opens the case.

Suspicion is thrown on Alex, but then he receives an email that may be from Margot, possibly from beyond the grave.

Unravelling the mystery, Alex finds himself wanted by the police and hunted by a gang of sadistic enforcers with shadowy backing, and as the bodies pile up staying alive long enough to solve the riddle is not guaranteed.

Dustin Hoffman lookalike Cluzet makes a good Harrison Ford type everyman, convincingly calming a violent criminal enough to hand over his sick son and rushing across six lanes of Paris rush hour traffic and plunging through market stalls in a knockout chase scene, the film’s standout set-piece.

Canet just about reins in the source novel’s disparate plot threads that also involve Alex’s lesbian show-jumping sister and her lesbian lover (Scott-Thomas) and a controlling politico and his spoilt son (French legend Rochefort and Canet himself in a cameo), maintaining a swift momentum for two solid hours.

The final revelation is pedestrian MacGuffin that does not withstand close interrogation, but getting there proves so much fun there is no danger of feeling short changed.

Smart, exciting, dripping with femmes who fatale and reminiscent of Hitchcock, Tell No One is the best Gallic thriller since 36 (whose director Olivier Marchal has a small part here), and marks Canet as a director to watch.

Rob Daniel