A frequently asked question about Alain Resnais is how the French auteur can reconcile his non-linear, dreamlike movies of the 1960s (Hiroshima Mon Amour, Last Year in Marienbad) with the high theatricality in his later work, such as the romantic comedies On Connait la Chanson (1997) and Not on the Lips (2003).

As an overtly dramatic account of the encounters among six lovelorn and lost souls in Paris, Private Fears in Public Places hardly seems to answer that question. Resnais' latest film, an adaptation of an Alan Ayckbourn play, is driven mostly by soap-opera- like drama.

What makes Private Fears Resnais' return to form, however, is the way he refashions Ayckbourn's story (and screenplay) with a ravishing exploration of the notion of space.

What underlines the tribulations of the film's protagonists is their commonly shared problem of being shackled in claustrophobic relationships, whether it's between the drifting-apart lovers Dan (Lambert Wilson) and Nicole (Laura Morante); siblings Thierry (Andre Dussolier) and Gaelle (Isabelle Carre); or Lionel (Pierre Arditi), his vile bed-ridden father (Claude Rich) and his carer Charlotte (Sabine Azema). There's also the frisson between Thierry and Charlotte, colleagues at a real estate agency.

Property plays a big part in the characters' lives, and provides a key that links Private Fears with Last Year in Marienbad. That Resnais seeks to revisit Marienbad is evident at the start of the film. Nicole, seeking a bigger pad for herself and Dan, reproaches Thierry for bringing her to a flat below her requirements. The camera pans upwards and floats amid the apartment's dome-shaped ceiling - a shot that reprises the opening scenes of Marienbad, a series of similar observations of a countryside manor's grand interiors.

Just as Marienbad revolves around people trapped within the confines of a sanatorium-like chateau, the lives of the characters in Private Fears drift through Resnais' soundstage interiors, their hopes for love and escape thwarted nearly at every turn. Here, Resnais is ingenious in relating how physical space can regulate and illustrate the mental schisms of those who inhabit it. Running on the dual layers of the directors' allegorical mise-en-scene and the nuanced stories of Ayckbourn's play, Private Fears is the filmmaker's most substantial work in years.