“Creators of intensely naturalistic films about lower class life in Belgium, brothers Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne have created a body of work since 1996 which places them clearly at the fore of contemporary Belgian cinema and among the world’s most critically respected filmmakers”. My favorite film of theirs, La Promesse, stars Jeremie Renier as the son of a conman who’s about to embark on the same path of deception as his father, but is offered a choice to redeem himself in the guise of an immigrant worker whose spouse has been fatally wronged. Adopting a steady but unclinical gaze, the Dardennes take a long, clear-eyed look at moral-imbued decision making, sometimes coming off like an especially exciting exercise in ethics class. As one critic pointed out, the film depicts the “birth of a conscience”, and that’s accurate enough. With its languid silent beauty and moments of documentary lucidity, La Promesse just can’t seem to make its way out of my head.