'Grand Central' is a French film starring Tahar Rahim ('A Prophet') as Gary (a splendid French name), a man with a criminal past. It can't have been a very successful criminal career - Gary seems to own one set of clothes only - so it's probably just as well he is looking for honest work, which he finds at a nuclear power station. But accidents involving radiation - not to mention starting an affair with the fiancée (Léa Seydoux - 'Blue is the Warmest Colour') of one of his colleagues - mean things will get worse before they get better.

This film nails its gender equality colours firmly to the mast in the love scenes between Rahim and Seydoux: she has to go full-frontal, while he shows no more than you'd see at a family beach. One would think a film directed by a woman (Rebecca Zlotowski, who also co-wrote) would be a bit more equal (either covering her up, or - preferably - stripping him off!) Apart from that I can't say this film excited any strong emotion in me: I didn't enjoy it, but to say I disliked it would be too strong - it was on the screen, I watched it, and when it had finished I got up and left the cinema. I can't even explain why I feel so indifferent to it: definitely a 'so-so' film.

The film describes the professional and extra-professional daily life of a band of John Doe providing maintenance within a nuclear power plant. They live in a few mobil-homes of a camping site. They are collectively lost, sometimes philosophers sometimes disillusioned. They survive as rebels without a real illusion about their future.

I recently saw this movie on Netlix that I chose based on the high-quality cast: Tahar Rahim, Denis Ménochet and Olivier Gourmet. With also Johan Libéreau, Léa Seydoux and Nahuel Pérez Biscayart. The director Rebecca Zlotowski seems to hesitate between the social satire and the hanky-panky, as if she were herself as lost as the characters of her own film.

As a synthesis: excellent acting in a film that seems unfinished. 5/6 of 10

Despite the well-told story here, because of its nature (i.e. Not usually involving violent explosions), the very real jeopardy involved in nuclear contamination doesn't really come across on screen, I felt.

As such, the tension in the film has to rely also on the (fairly standard) love triangle issues and the relative poverty that drives people to do such hazardous work.

Not a bad film by any means, but ultimately not as engaging as I thought it was going to be...