This film is both a psychological thriller and a comment on the damage that hatred inflicts. On several levels it can make you look at people's actions and how it can happen that we can become driven by our negative impulses rather than by compassion and understanding. Also the film looks at how the pressures to achieve success, feel loved and wanted, and have a sense of personal empowerment dominates modern life, and when people feel like failures in these realms, the inclination to become bitter and then lash out somehow can take over. Robin Wright Penn does an excellent job of portraying the main female character -- with the risk of giving too much away here, she makes this woman a composite of both sensitivity and instability so that there is a growing awareness of unpredictability concerning her actions and where the movie is going. Abdel Kechiche, the actor who plays the Syrian cab driver, is compelling as well.