'You Will Be My Son': Family troubles in the vineyard

The most quietly terrifying presence in film today belongs to a gray-haired, 64-year-old French actor with a Danish name. You Will Be My Son is all the persuading you'll need.

Best known for his two films with Jacques Audiard, A Prophet and The Beat That My Heart Skipped, Niels Arestrup has also appeared in Steven Spielberg's War Horse and, more recently, Belgian director Joachim Lafosse's grueling Our Children.

You Will Be My Son, directed, cowritten, and coproduced by Gilles Legrand, is a strongly acted, character-driven melodrama about the dynamics of family in general and father-son issues in particular. It presents situations so emotionally supercharged that the whole story could have come straight out of Balzac.

Perfectionist Paul de Marseul, the kind of guy who puts a final polish on his shoes with Hennessy cognac, runs a prestigious Bordeaux vineyard that has been in his family for 11 generations. As played by Arestrup, he is not someone to be trifled with.

Legrand has shrewdly chosen to introduce Paul at his most charming, flirting with a journalist in order to get good press for his wines. Even when he smiles and fascinates, however, an air of palpable menace surrounds him.

This dark side comes out when he deals with his son Martin (Lorant Deutsch), who works in the winery in an administrative capacity. A tyrant with nothing but contempt for his heir, Paul never misses a chance to mock him and his university education.

A lifetime of being treated like a servant has made the clearly competent Martin into a nervous, uncertain adult. He may have an attractive wife (Anne Marivin), but being dismissed as an inept child is his daily lot.

A pair of complications bring this heady mixture to a rolling boil. First is the illness of Francois Amelot (the veteran Patrick Chesnais), Paul's longtime estate manager. With no one to oversee the harvest, Martin begs for the chance.

Then a further complication emerges - the return home of Francois' son Philippe (Nicolas Bridet), an accomplished winemaker in his own right, and the kind of son Paul always wishes he had. His presence on the estate complicates things for everyone in ways both foreseen and unexpected.

Parent's guide: R (brief sexuality and language)

Running time: 1 hour, 42 mins.

Playing: Ritz EastEndText