When cuckolded Catherine (Ardant) twigs that husband Bernard (Depardieu) is playing away from home she doesn't beat a path to the door of Relate.

Instead, she hotfoots it to a Paris brothel and hires hooker, Emmanuelle Beart - who could pout for France - to seduce her husband and relay back exactly what happens.

The unexpected result - something a marriage guidance counsellor couldn't remotely aspire to - is a sort of sex life by proxy.

Nathalie - the name Beart assumes for the assignations - delivers back the sort of dialogue you'd expect to hear on a naughty late-night chatline... and Catherine finds her latent sexuality re-awakening.

As the staged relationship grows deeper, Catherine finds herself addicted to the raunchy Chinese whispers, while Nathalie admits what may once have been business is now pleasure.

Ardant's Catherine remains a bit of an enigma - a female gynaecologist who seems to bring the same level of professional detachment to her life as she does her job.

She's not enouraged by a cad of a hubbie who claims his extra-marital affairs "don't count" and wonderingly inquires of his wife "aren't you above all that?"

And there's not a lot of support from Catherine's feckless sloth of a mother, who merely comments that Bernard's behaviour is a "nuisance".

Compelling in a slightly seedy way, this boasts terrific performances, particularly from Ardant and Beart as the two women whose bizarre relationship is made to appear both natural and believable.

The twist - when it comes - could have been spotted further down the line and provides for an unsatisfactory pat ending and rather lets down what's gone before.

An intriguing tale but not a course of action you'd expect Denise from Richard and Judy to advocate.

Tim Evans