Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem in Everybody Knows (Cannes Film Festival)

Asghar Farhadi broke the Cannes opening night curse this year and kicked off the 12-day event with his Spanish ensemble drama Everybody Knows, set within the confines of an insular, backstabbing village. After winning two Academy Awards for best foreign-language film—A Separation (2011) and The Salesman (2016)—the Iranian director’s profile has been further raised by helming the first film screened at the festival; his new work had the whole press corps, some 4,000 members strong, to itself, since there were no other films screening on the first day. Having international stars Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem leading the large cast also gives the film a potential audience boost.

Unlike other recent openers, such as the biopic Grace of Monaco and Woody Allen’s Café Society, there is nothing embarrassing or underwhelming about this selection. It’s thoroughly well-made, from the sun-speckled cinematography to the acting (not a side-eye glance is wasted). However, the story line follows a fairly predictable path without the whiplash turns or loaded revelations present in Farhadi’s Iranian output. The audience will easily be on the not-so secret that the entire town knows. The real question is: Who doesn’t?

Farhadi builds a simmering tension from the moment Laura (Penélope Cruz) arrives back in her hometown and unpacks her suitcase. She has been living in Argentina and has returned to the family nest for a wedding. Her husband, Alejandro (Ricardo Darín), has stayed behind, but Laura has brought along her cherubic young son and her teenage daughter, Irene (Carla Campra). The teen immediately catches the eye of a small-town Romeo, the nephew of Paco (Bardem), Laura’s old flame, who was once a servant in her household and now runs a vineyard.

Everyone is under surveillance, either by the stoic village onlookers or a drone hovering in the sky during the matrimonial festivities. The director effectively puts the audience ill at ease, with clues that disaster is about to strike, namely due to the carefree, some might say reckless, behavior of Irene. Suffering no jet lag whatsoever, she runs off at the first chance for a rendezvous with a boy she barely knows, and she drives his moped at a high speed, even though she doesn’t know how to ride a bike.  Then, during the post-wedding reception, she mysteriously vanishes.

The motivations of Laura’s once well-heeled landowning family are somewhat porous. The actions undertaken, whether self-sacrificial or conspiratorial, are obligatory tropes, so that the entire household and hamlet may be guilty of kidnapping Irene. As a result, the setup feels effortful. In its need to stir up the plot, the film is less convincing as an Agatha Christie-style whodunit. And yes, many scenes are set in a parlor, where most of the potential suspects are gathered together to lash out and hash it out.

Though Cruz’s Laura is the central—and tortured—figure here, the supporting cast actually has the more nuanced and enigmatic roles in this script, which owes a greater debt to TV’s Dallas than Farhadi’s more character-focused early films. The biggest surprises waiting for many viewers will be the introductions of actresses Elvira Mínguez and Bárbara Lennie. Both have a strong presence and bring clarity to the melodrama. (Lennie also stars in Petras in the Directors Fortnight program.)

This is also the director’s first film in which he deliberately indicates what he wants the audience to see and know. Not once, but twice, he cuts to a close-up of an important clue, and he directs one actor in particular to shift his posture and to barely meet the others’ gazes. Why the other family members cannot pick up on this person’s guilty behavior unintentionally adds another layer to the crime-solving riddle.

In an interview with The Wrap, Cruz admitted that she had to go to the hospital for hyperventilation after filming a scene where her character, the mother of a missing child, has a breakdown. Laura’s distress, as well as the actress’s effort, is definitely apparent but adds little to her character. It’s also around this point that the film runs out of steam as the family’s secrets are dutifully doled out. However, in a wordless closing scene free of mannerisms, the filmmaker’s earlier alchemy fully returns, and Farhadi concludes the proceedings on a higher, quieter, and thoughtful note.