It tells the story of a nightclub bouncer who falls in love with a woman who trains killer whales and loses her legs in a workplace accident.

Alain "Ali" van Versch, an unemployed single father in his twenties, arrives in Antibes to look for work to support his young son, Sam.

He later gets a new job as a security guard, where his co-worker Martial informs him of an illegal fighting racket where he can earn money in bouts.

Ali visits her and takes her to a beach, where he persuades her to go swimming; though hesitant at first, Stéphanie eventually forgets her self-consciousness and is liberated by the experience.

Their friendship evolves to include casual sex, though Stéphanie prevents deeper intimacy by forbidding kissing during their encounters.

Her co-workers tell her that Ali was found installing surveillance cameras at her job, at the behest of the management so they could spy on employees' activities.

The site's critical consensus states, "Surging on strong performances from Marion Cotillard and Matthias Schoenaerts, Rust and Bone is as vibrant and messily unpredictable as life itself.

[23] HitFix praised Audiard "for the way he takes melodramatic convention and bends it to his own particular sensibility, delivering a powerful tale about the reminders we all carry of the pains that have formed us" and found Cotillard's work "incredible, nuanced and real.

"[24] Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian gave the film a four-star rating out of five, writing Rust and Bone is "a passionate and moving love story which surges out of the screen like a flood tide" and "its candour and force are matched by the commitment and intelligence of its two leading players.

"[25] Time's Mary Corliss found that the romance is "sometimes engrossing, sometimes exasperating" and that the cinematography recalls Kings Row and An Affair to Remember."

Corliss also wrote, "Schoenaerts exudes masculinity that is both effortless and troubled" while "Cotillard demonstrates again her eerie ability to write complex feelings on her face, as if from the inside, without grandstanding her emotions" and added, "her strong, subtle performance is gloriously winning on its own.

"[26] Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune thought Schoenaerts' sensitive-brute instincts recall Marlon Brando and Tom Hardy.

[27] Critic A. O. Scott of The New York Times called the film "a strong, emotionally replete experience, and also a tour de force of directorial button pushing.

"[28] Roger Ebert, who did not review the film upon its original release, later gave it four stars in February 2013[29] and said it was the latest title in his "Great Movies" collection.

[31] James Kaelan of MovieMaker wrote: "Besides Emmanuelle Riva in Amour and Isidora Simijonovic in Clip, I would argue strongly that no actress gave a better performance in 2012 than Cotillard in Rust and Bone, and it was a travesty she wasn't nominated for an Academy Award.

"[33] In France, Rust and Bone was released to 394 screens, where it debuted at number one at the box office and sold a total of 1,930.536 million tickets.