Rotterdam 2026 Review: MURDER IN THE BUILDING, Funny Hitchcockian Shenanigans

Time flies when you're having fun, and that saying applies to the International Film Festival Rotterdam. Last Saturday there was the screening of the closing film already, the world première of Rémi Bezançon's Le Crime du 3e Étage, to be released internationally as Murder in the Building. It's a comedy crime thriller starring Gilles Lellouche and Laetitia Casta, and time did fly during the screening as well as people were having a lot of fun with it.

In the film, we follow François and Colette. François writes adventure novels and Colette is a renowned expert on Hitchcock, giving lectures at the university about suspense in films. Their time together lacks spice though; François stays indoors in his pyjamas all the time, writing, while Colette daydreams about classic films.

That changes one evening when Colette, looking out of the window, sees into the home of the neighbors, who are fighting. Suspecting (but not sure) she just saw someone being murdered, Colette convinces François to help her find out a bit more before they go to the police... and before you know it, they are into more adventure and suspense than they'd like.

The big elephant in the room, with a film like this, is Hitchcock, and specifically Rear Window. Thankfully, writer-director Rémi Bezançon does not shy away from that, indeed he makes sure you know it from the first few minutes onward, showing clips, having Colette explain things to her students, and basically peppering the entire film in Hitchcock jokes and references. For fans of the Master of Suspense, this is almost a quiz film. Some of the jokes are too easy, too obvious, but many land and Murder in the Building is often laugh-out-loud funny. Some drawn-out sequences are delightful even.

In part this comes from the central couple as played by Gilles Lellouche and Laetitia Casta, who have great chemistry together. The script allows them plenty of witty lines and moments and the couple seem to have fun in the most infectious way. Sure, you expect their experiences to bring their characters closer, the film doesn't break any new ground that way. And the mystery here is not too hard to solve, is even over-explained in places, but Bezançon basically just uses the plot to show his protagonists bumbling through several set-ups which expose them to ridicule, embarrassment and (indeed) danger. A great Guillaume Gallienne provides the counterweight, as the neighbor-with-a-secret who gets increasingly annoyed by the nosy François and Colette, in a role which could have been Tim Curry's thirty years ago.

This was most definitely a crowdpleaser, Had this film been placed earlier in the festival, before the audience winner was made known, it could even have had a stab at the top of the list. That was impossible though, as Murder in the Building was still being finished in the week the festival started (the programme even mentioned a different title). Be that as it may, the audience I went with left the venue still grinning, and I also had a very good time with it. Highly recommended!


Murder in the Building had its world première last weekend at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, and will be in general release in France later this year. Until then, try catching it at a festival.