Louis Trebor, an ex-mercenary living in the Jura Mountains, is suffering increasingly from a heart condition.

[2] Claire Denis also takes inspiration from Robert Louis Stevenson's writing and Paul Gauguin's South Seas paintings.

The website's critical consensus reads, "The impressionistic narrative may confound the viewer, but Denis crafts wonderfully poetic, dreamlike imagery.

"[8] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 85 out of 100, based on 13 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".

"[10] Jay Weissberg of Variety wrote, "More opaque than her past works and unlikely to garner her new fans, Denis gives near equal weight to reality, dreams, nightmares and premonitions, resisting a traditional narrative in order to question the possibilities of escape within the modern world.