A Secret

Informed that his elderly father has mysteriously disappeared, anxious Parisian François (Mathieu Amalric) recalls his tragic family history in director Claude Miller's adaptation of the fact-based novel by author Philippe Grimbert. As a sickly young child, François instinctively knew that he was a disappointment to his champion swimmer mother, Tania, and gymnast father, Maxime. While François does find some amount of solace in his friendship with kindly masseuse Louise (Julie Depardieu), his discovery of a strange toy in the attic causes his parents to act more strangely toward him than ever before. Feeling sympathetic toward the young boy, Louise eventually reveals to François that he once had a half-brother, and that his parents weren't drawn together by fairy-tale romance but through violence and strife of the Second World War.