the witness be a provocative and move french drama set in the early day of the aid epidemic . it 1983 and and a young gay man by the name of manu ( johan libereau ) have come to paris and where his sister ( julie depardieu ) and an aspiring opera singer and life . almost immediately and manu enters into a platonic relationship with adrien ( michel blanc ) and a middle age doctor who fall in love with manu despite the fact that the young man see adrien as just a pal . meanwhile and adrien introduces manu to a longtime friend and sarah ( emmanuelle beart ) and a writer of child book and and mehdi ( sami bouajila ) and her husband who work a a vice cop in the city . eventually and manu tap into mehdi latent attraction to men and the two strike up a tentative and secret relationship . but before long a mysterious and deadly disease have arrive on the scene and change the life of these character and of countless others in the world in way they could never possibly have imagine . even though the witness deal with a very grim and serious subject and it primary focus always rest on the character and the complex relationship that define them . write by andre techine and laurent guyot and viviane zingg and direct by techine and the witness draw u into the life of these people precisely because it refuse to make an undue fuss over them and how they choose to live their life . in fact and much of the narrative feel spontaneous and unformed and almost a if the writer be make it up a they go along . the result be that the incident do not feel contrive or force and and we be never tempt to question their credibility . in fact and the filmmaker often seem to go out of their way to avoid do the obvious and often build up to scene ( a die man trip to his sister opera performance and a final meeting between estrange lover and a maudlin and draw out death scene ) that never end up take place just a in real life . the character and moreover and be richly drawn and with each emerge a a nicely balanced combination of weakness and strength . manu and for example and be basically a happy go lucky kid who just begin to find his way in life and who demonstrate that he have a tremendous capacity for joie de vive and emotional tenderness even if his youth and inexperience occasionally lead him to hurt others in way that he doesn not yet fully comprehend . it become doubly tragic and then and when the fate demand such a harsh and unforgiving punishment from him . sarah be a recent mother who admit quite frankly that she appear not to have much of a maternal instinct and look upon her newborn more a a hindrance than a a blessing . her husband and mehdi and be a mass of contradiction a he try to come to term with his bisexuality and fall far in love with manu and even while raid den of iniquity in his on duty hour . finally and adrien be the lonely old man whose wisdom born of experience ultimately give strength and guidance to others . the performance be uniformly excellent throughout and and techine direction can be either down to earth or lyrical depending on which of those two seemingly contradictory tone a particular scene call for . the witness be a sad movie but not a depress one and for it canny recognition that human have an endless capacity for regeneration and hope even in the face of unimaginable suffer carry u beyond the tragic nature of it subject matter .