French veteran director André Téchiné proves he remains one of the foremost chroniclers of French life and human relationships in general with his haunting new drama Les témoins (The Witnesses), which played in competition at the recent Berlinale. This multi-layered story set in the 1980s focuses on the contrasts between illness and health, sex and romance, friendship and companionship and the fluidity of all these categories in the face of the capriciousness of both life and the humans who get to live it to tell the tale. Despite a disappointing opening on French soil, this highly intelligent drama should connect with arthouse audiences across the continent before finding an even bigger following on DVD.

Téchiné (Les temps qui changent/Changing Times) has long proved to be a master of condensing his preoccupations in such a way that only a few players are needed to bring his universal themes into sharp -- though certainly not unambiguous -- focus. In Les témoins, which the director co-wrote with Laurent Guyot and Viviane Zingg, the motor of the story is the attractive youngster Manu, played by Johan Libéreau, who proves here that his great debut in Douches froides (Cold Showers) was no accident. A plucky and uncomplicated gay boy from the provinces, Manu unexpectedly turns up on the doorstep of his sister's rented room in a Parisian house of ill repute to move in and enjoy big city life. Julie (Julie Depardieu) is actually an opera trainee but can't find nor afford anything better to live in and would rather see her brother go. But one flash of Manu's winning and sincere smile is all that is needed to convince her otherwise.

When cruising for sex in a park late at night, Manu encounters the 50-year-old doctor Adrien (veteran actor Michel Blanc) who offers him company and a place to crash, though, on Manu's insistence, their relationship remains strictly platonic. In one of the signs of Téchiné's economic storytelling, a children's book author working on her first adult novel (Emmanuelle Béart, from Téchiné's Les égarés / Strayed) and her police officer husband (Sami Bouajila, from Indigènes / Days of Glory) are all that is needed to bring the tale to life -- and, later, death and beyond. Béart's Sarah (who occasionally provides the voice-over narration) is a good friend of Adrien and has just had her first child for whom she cares little (She resorts to writing with her earplugs in place when the child's crying keeps her out of her concentration.) Mehdi seems to enjoy his role as a father more but barely has any time as his work as a tough Parisian law enforcer is not only a full-time job but really a way of life.

On a weekend at the seaside home of Sarah's parents, Adrien introduces Manu to the busy couple and his magical smile seems to work its effect on everyone, but especially Mehdi, who is as surprised as anyone to fall for the handsome young man. The exact moment of the proverbial spark can almost be seen literally in a beautifully photographed sequence that starts with Mehdi and Manu horsing around in and under water to the latter's near-drowning and Mehdi dragging Manu to shore and his shocking realisation that -- while holding him in a position that uncannily evokes Michelangelo's Pietà -- as a policeman and a fellow human being it is his duty to apply mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

This scene is the pivot on which the story turns. Mehdi and Manu begin a clandestine affair that basically consists of daily meetings for sex (Medhi and Sarah have an open marriage); Adrien finds out and finds the thought that somebody else is having sex with Manu unbearable (but especially the fact that it is Sarah's husband) and Manu then comes down with a mysterious illness that Adrien tries his best to understand. Sarah, in turn, finally finds inspiration for her work in the turmoil of the characters' personal lives, though the others are not too keen to see their troubles exposed except for Manu, who realises that there is no cure in sight for AIDS and he is deteriorating quickly. At least his story is something a penniless youngster like him can leave behind.

The same scene also highlights many other important aspects of the film, notably its stunning cinematography by Julien Hirsch (César winner for Lady Chatterley), which uses a slightly larger-than-usual grain that puts everything on screen squarely in the pre-digital era. The shot of the lifeless Manu as held by Mehdi is but one of the film's many carefully composed images that are not only beautiful but also resonate on a thematic level. Earlier, Manu was shown running along the rocky coast in a travelling shot that ends when Manu runs up into a barren tree and cannot climb up any further, cut off from the ground yet not yet up in the sky.

Another mesmerizing shot shows Manu and his sister in two alternated close-ups in a completely still lake. Both face the camera but are unable to speak because their mouths are submerged in the water. Not speaking would seem fatal for an opera singer and someone who wants to pass on his story, but both seem serene, even happy. The continuous presence of water is important throughout the film and is used as an indicator of fluidity in general and to reflect the passage yet the muteness of time ("one can never step into the same river twice yet the river is a constant presence").

The fluidity of water is also a physical reminder that category boundaries in human relationships are not as clear-cut as they might at first appear. Mehdi, for example, is a revealed to be not only a butch law enforcer but also a loving father and a passionate and caring lover who withers away when Manu refuses to see him when AIDS turns him into a physical wreck. Clearly, for Medhi their relationship was about more than sex alone (Bouajila's extraordinary performance is a revelation; watch the scene in which he visits Manu at the camping: it feels like a French-language outtake of Brokeback Mountain -- it is that intense). Likewise Adrien is revealed to be more than the forced-to-be-platonic admirer; Sarah is not just a woman with a writer's block and a form of postnatal depression and Manu is not just an innocent young man hit by adversity. Only Julie is somewhat underdeveloped and could have used some more screentime.

Still, Téchine, aided by his screenwriters and his regular editor Martine Giordano, succeeds in cramming more material into his 112-minute film than in all the 350 minutes of Angels in America combined. More importantly, it is not strictly about AIDS but "just" about human beings trying to get on with life for however long it may last and -- if they are lucky -- bear witness to the strength and complexity of the human spirit.