Directing: A-
Acting: B+
Writing: B+
Cinematography: B+
Editing: A-

Two of Us is a hard movie to talk about without revealing too much, depending on what your definition of “spoiler” is. I guess I’ll say this up front: there are no mater plot twists. That is, unless you count what serves as the inciting incident in this case, which happens a little while into the movie (spoiler alert): one of the two main characters has a stroke.

What this movie has going for it, more than anything, is that its two protagonists are older women. The fact that they are a lesbian couple is incidental to the film’s value, even though their having been in the closet for decades is crucial to the plot.

In a sense, Two of Us (just called Deux in its original French) is about what kind of massive messes you can find yourself in when you keep your relationship a secret all your life. Martine and Barbara (Madeleine Girard and Nina Dorn) have known each other since childhood, since before Martine’s marriage and birth of her two children, and well after the death of her husband. Martine’s two grown children, Anne and Frédéric (Léa Drucker and Jérôme Varanfrain), look after her as best they can while also nursing varying levels of resentment toward her, particularly on the part of Frédéric. Neither of them know that Barbara has been living in the apartment across thehall from Martine for years, coming over to sleep in her bed every night.

Barbara is eager for Martine to come out to her family after all this time, and director and co-writer Filippo Meneghetti opts not to give us any backstory specific to why Martine is so hesitant. Barbara wants the two of them to retire together to Rome, the city in which they met, and in a scene that merely hints at the tensions to come, Martine braces for confession and then bails. I’d love to know why Martine has such a hard time with this, but then, it may be beside the point, except to say that situations like this often perpetuate themselves, making it that much more frightening to break out of the longer they last.

But, Martine’s stroke changes everything. There’s a lot that’s unique about this movie, and I do rather wish more were made in America that move in these sorts of directions. There’s a lot more tension here than one might expect first going in, creating a suspense of sorts, as Barbara sneaks into Martine’s apartment under under increasingly dangerous circumstances. She becomes entangled with a live-in caregiver who I think may be intended as a minor antagonist, but I just found myself feeling bad for her—even as I empathized with Barbara, who, in her desperation to get back into the arms of the love of her arts, engages in basic sabotage.

Furthermore, Martine’s children do not react to the revelation of their mother’s sexuality very well. It’s difficult to root for any of the characters in this film besides Martine and Barbara, but again, Meneghetti gives every one of them enough nuance to empathize with them. You totally understand why they do and say the things they do, even if it’s not the best choice they could have made. Finding out you’ve been lied to for twenty years can do that to you.

Two of Us is acutely effective as drama, and much of it feels like it might qualify as tragedy. But, never fear; I have a feeling Meneghetti is well aware of how tired we all are of gay tragedies in cinema. Things don’t end well for everyone in this story, and there remains something sad about all of the relationships in the end, but this movie still gives us what we want out of it. The satisfaction in its conclusion comes as a welcome relief. This is one example of a VOD title for which it’s worth paying the seven bucks

Overall: B+