A sophisticated American in Paris, psychiatrist Liliane Steiner has a habit of recording her sessions. Is it because her patients speak French, and she’s afraid of missing a thought? (I doubt much eludes Jodie Foster, who plays the almost Hitchcockian character in her first significant French-language role in more than 20 years.) Or is it because Liliane isn’t really listening to these people, whose problems all sound so frivolous, they practically blend together in a torrent of white noise on the soundtrack of “Private Life”?

In Rebecca Zlotowski’s sleek but slippery psychological thriller, Liliane is caught off guard by the news that Paula Cohen-Solal (Virginie Efira), a woman who failed to appear for her last three appointments, has in fact died by suicide. Liliane didn’t see it coming, and now she’s rattled, wondering what else she might have missed. Paula’s death sends Liliane back to her archives, listening for clues, though she’s not likely to find the truth there.