French director Jacques Deray’s 1969 psychodrama La Piscine is a film saturated by sunlight and sexual tension. Re-released for modern audiences, the film has been digitally restored, offering movie-goers the chance to see the film that brought Deray international recognition and critical attention on the big screen all over again.

Being French and based in the 1960s, La Piscine is almost effortlessly cool. The characters are impossibly good-looking and tragic, and seem to spend most of their time exchanging long, meaningful glances and mournfully smoking cigarettes. The tension between the characters is palpable, and the performances are hard to criticise. Delon and Schneider are particularly noticeable, with a sizzling on-screen chemistry that adds an erotically charged frisson to almost every scene.

However, the film itself is undeniably flawed. The plot is slow-moving and seems to lose momentum and direction as events come to a head and then drift to a slow close. The direction, while innovative and interesting, is occasionally jerky and irritating. Even the characters become hard to sympathise or connect with – but then maybe that is the point, their alienation from each other eventually rubbing off on the audience.  Unfortunately, there is only so much existential cigarette-smoking you can take, cool and stylish though it undeniably looks (despite what you were told in school) before you start to lose interest.

On saying this, the film has many things to commend it, not least the competent performances and occasionally arresting images. The action largely takes place around a swimming pool, which is a clever device, contrasting the initial domesticity of the location with the lurking dangers that it gradually presents. While the film may be lingering and clunky, the undeniable style of La Piscine shines through to make the film an interesting, if not always engaging watch.