Belgium’s Dardenne brothers specialise in the sort of austere moral fables that cinema usually runs a mile from: drab settings, handheld cameras, not much humour, even less music. Yet far from being neglected by the mainstream they are feted on the festival circuit and have twice won the Palme d’Or (for Rosetta in 1999, and for L’Enfant in 2005). Their last film, Two Days, One Night, even featured a bona fide film star, Marion Cotillard, in the lead role.

Like that film, the brothers’ latest focuses on a young woman trying to jolt the conscience of her community. Adèle Haenel plays Jenny Davin, a bright young GP who works around a tough working-class district of Liège. She is at a crossroads, torn between joining a cushy private practice or staying to maintain her run-down surgery for cash-strapped locals. One evening there comes a buzz on her office intercom, which she ignores. It is after hours, and she is too narked with her moody intern, Julien (Olivier Bonnaud), to be distracted.