I thought the last 5 minutes would sum up everything I saw. I was wrong. The ending is... I wouldn't even call it an ending. You're left wondering what actually happened in the film and what the explanation is. Even if you like interpreting things yourself - this film is very vague. You could say there were a lot of random events that happened but nothing came of them.For example the main character had a dodgy job - that's it. That's all I can tell you about it. Nothing ever came of it. Then the storyline moved onto something else which was never explained.I've seen a lot of rubbish films with rubbish endings but this film is completely ridiculous. I genuinely mean that. The film doesn't explain anything at all. In other rubbish films I've seen you get some sort of rubbish explanation... In this film there is no explanation what so ever.I definitely would not recommend this film at all.SPOILERS AHEAD: 1. Was the guy mentally ill or not? 2. Was the woman dead or not? 3. Why would he tell the supposed dead woman that he slept with someone else when he was also sleeping with her? Surely she'd mind...4. Why would he accept a dodgy job? 5. Why did we always get scenes of him in the woods? It was something he dreamed of in his book, but why show it in the film? What is the significance?

An American novelist arrives in Paris, hoping to reunite with his French wife and young daughter after being released from an institution, but his pleas for reconciliation are bluntly rejected. Shortly after this setback, his money and belongings are stolen, and he rents a room at a fleabag hotel owned by a sinister Lebanese, and quarrels with a foul-mouthed African over the filth in their shared toilet. As his life spirals towards fragmentation, he obsessively stalks his daughter's school playground during the day, and survives by working as a night watchman in an underground labyrinth. Invited to a literary party, he begins an affair with the mysterious widow of a Hungarian author, while also becoming intimate with the barmaid girlfriend of the hotel proprietor.Countless camera shots through railings and windows provide sledgehammer clues that the novelist's Parisian odyssey is the fantasy of a deranged patient still confined in some stateside institution, and his surreal misadventures represent the man's delusions intermingled with memories. The real identities of the other characters are fairly obvious - the hotel owner is the asylum governor - the African a fellow patient - the barmaid a nurse who dispenses medications. The two mistresses are archetypes of good and evil - the author's widow is a vampiric, dark-haired sophisticate, and could be a personification of the inmate's dead mother - while the younger one is a nurturing blonde Polish country girl who probably represents an idealized version of his wife. Who knows . . . or cares? Those who admire this downbeat clone of Mulholland Drive can unravel the puzzle.

This is a surrealistic tour de force shot in French by Polish director Pawel Pawlikowski, who also wrote the screenplay based upon the novel by American author Douglas Kennedy. Two of Kennedy's other novels have been filmed previously, the last being THE BIG PICTURE (2010), also shot in French. As for Pawlikowski, this is his fourth feature film, the previous one being MY SUMMER OF LOVE (2004). Before that he was a highly praised director of documentaries for British television. This film is very much in the tradition of André Breton's surrealistic novel NADJA, which has inspired so much of subsequent French fiction and cinema. We have the mysterious woman who may be mad, whom the novelist hero cannot resist, we have the strange regions of Paris, we have the atmosphere of dream and illusion. Hawke, having been rejected by his ex-wife and forbidden to approach or speak to his daughter, gets onto a Paris bus and falls asleep. He is woken at the end of line to discover that his luggage and all his money has been stolen from him while he slept. He goes into a small Arab café near the bus stop to order a coffee and try to think what to do. The Arab owner offers him a room to stay in in return for confiscating his passport. The owner is married to a pathetic, depressed young Polish girl who dreams of better things but is trapped in her circumstances. Hawke, unable to sort out any other possibility for himself, accepts a mysterious night job operating access to a gangster hideout associated with the owner of the café. One day he wanders into a bookshop and is recognised by a man working there as the author of a well-known novel. The man enthusiastically invites him to a gathering of poets and writers, which he attends some days later. There he meets the infinitely mysterious 'woman of the Fifth' ('the Fifth' here is a section of the Left Bank of Paris, not a measure of whiskey), named Margit, played with arch menace and erotic intensity by Kristin Scott Thomas. He appeals to her and he ends up becoming involved with her at her insistence. But then bizarre things begin to happen. People start getting killed and he is arrested for a murder he did not commit. He takes refuge in the arms of Joanna Kulig, the young Polish actress who plays the café owner's wife. This too has consequences. Things become increasingly complex and inexplicable, and events seem to become more and more imaginary, as Hawke struggles to understand what is happening. The film's atmosphere is thick enough to cut with a knife, and the film is very artfully made. If you want to be puzzled and fascinated by mysteries which appear insoluble, this is for you.

Before I watched this movie I was warned about all the unanswered questions that many reviews had mentioned. And there surely are lots of unanswered questions and an incomplete feeling. But I think I get it - it's told from the point of view of a schizophrenic person and ONLY his point of view. And for that it is actually quite good.Everything isn't neatly explained at the end - but it doesn't really need to be. In life you don't really get to see things from all points of view anyway. What is hinted at is good enough. Of course it would have been more satisfying to have explanatory sequences or flashbacks to show how the murder took place or how the fantasy of Kristin Scott Thomas's character evolved. Or how his daughter was taken and released.The acting is fine. Ethan Hawke is quite good in this complex role. He's a bit gaunt and disheveled but that's the role. Kristin is stylishly alluring. Liked the twist that the minorities who seem menacing are actually not the real terror.The unresolved issues might put many off and hurt its box office. So might the rather ugly portrayal of Paris. But overall I think it is worth a watch if you bear in mind the unique point of view and the incompleteness is deliberate.