Thoughts on Michel's wife *spoiler*

Firstly, I'd like to say just how much I loved this film.
I new practically nothing about the film before watching it, only that it was supposed to have terrific acting, which it did. I didn't even know it was French; I, for some reason had this idea that it would be set in Britain.

However I came across an ambiguity with Michel - probably intentional considering the tone of the film, but maybe I missed something so I'd like to hear what others thought.

According to what Juillette's sister heard, Michel's wife died 10 years ago in a car accident - however from what I could gather this is never actually confronted.

This is fair enough but earlier on in the film Michel tells Juillette in confidence that he has been teaching in prisons for the past 10 years - i.e. the same amount of time since his wife's death.

From what I could tell this little mystery never gets resolved. So what did happen? Did his wife actually go to prison, was his wife murdered / did the other driver in the car accident situation go to prison and so to try and understand such an awful event he goes to the prison in pursuit of some sort of closure.


By the way, I think it's best that I also mention that I live next to a pub, which was having a karaoke night and so was under constant distraction and never really had a chance to give the film 100% of my concentration.

Thank you in advance for any replies.