Without the sinister opening credit sequence, Le Boucher could be initially mistaken for a romantic comedy starring Hélène, a pretty school teacher and Popaul, a cynical, brooding butcher who has just returned from the Algerian War to resume life in an idyllic French village. Their burgeoning love is blocked by respective emotional scars and darkly accentuated by news reports of serial killings. The butcher’s persistence and the encroaching murders set Hélène on edge – threatening to expose the cracks in this picaresque shell. Alternating between spectral serenity and jarring discord, the film eerily details the myriad acts of violence committed by the emotionally civilized. – BG