This film, whose surface is very clearly a clothing designer's strange, and perhaps manipulative, relationship with a young woman, gives much of its plot away in trailer form. The film opens with Cyril (Lesley Manville) dismissing the significant other of her brother, Reynolds (Daniel Day-Lewis). So, I suppose she wasn't so significant after all. Reynolds then goes to the country and immediately finds himself smitten with his waitress, Alma (Vicky Krieps).

She immediately takes to him, and becomes his muse and lover. Throughout the film, their dynamic begins to shift, but she still struggles with being ignored and demeaned by such a demanding and emotionally controlling figure. Eventually, Alma gains the upper hand of being needed when she "mildly" poisons Reynolds. This leads to them getting married, sigh, and the relationship going from there.

In the end, the audience sees that Alma is going to poison him again, and we think that she might be about to kill him, as they had been arguing. Then, we learn that he knows he's going to be poisoned, and will just need to be completely reliant on Alma for a little while, in order to come down off his high horse for a bit.

Overall, this movie was fairly predictable, and not all that interesting to me. The themes contained that can be useful in faith discussion include, power dynamics and consent as we involve ourselves in relationships, abuse of power, harming those we love and the enjoyment that problematically has, and Christ-like love, which is really only present in the person of Cyril, who cares for all of the people throughout, even though it is often at personal cost.