A raw, ragged study of loss

There are two remarkable scenes in “Pieces of a Woman,” though the first — an almost 30-minute, largely unbroken opening shot of a home birth — seems set to divert critical attention from the second.

That scene, arriving about halfway through the movie, feels at least as radical and courageous as its precedent. In it, we see the central couple, Martha and Sean ( Vanessa Kirby and Shia LaBeouf), try to have sex. Both are grieving the death of their child; but while Martha has turned inward, Sean is reaching out with visible aggression.

The tussle teeters on the verge of force; what deflects that impression is our knowledge of the couple’s closeness (beautifully established in the opening scene) and Kirby’s intensely physical performance. Using chiefly body language, she conveys Martha’s desperate need to match her husband’s desire, to feel something other than emptiness.

It would be regrettable, therefore, if the current allegations of abuse against LaBeouf were to distract from her skill.

Piercing an intimate, natural tone with almost soapy slivers of melodrama, “Pieces of a Woman” comes close to wringing you out. The English-language debut of Hungarian director Kornel Mundruczo ( best known for his jaw-dropping

2015 drama, “White God”), the movie doesn’t always gel: The couple’s pursuit of legal action against their seemingly blameless midwife (Molly Parker) feels at odds with the movie’s dense emotionalism.

Yet when everything clicks, the screenplay ( by the director’s wife, Kata Weber, drawing on memories of a similar experience) lucidly shows how an unimaginable loss can spark a cascade of atrophy.

As Sean, a construction worker in longtime recovery,

BENJAMIN LOEB — NETFLIX Vanessa Kirby portrays a woman grappling with the loss of her first child during a home birth in “Pieces of a Woman.”