The term “body horror” is one that carries with it a lot of expectations. If you were to hear it at last year’s Cannes, it would have likely been used in reference to the breakout hit “The Substance,” with its gallons of bloody viscera being splashed all over the screen. But there are also the works of body horror that rely less on external spectacle. Take Julia Ducournau’s quietly flooring “Alpha,” the knockout follow-up to her Palme d’Or-winning “Titane.”

While similar in many regards to her first two features, “Raw” and “Titane,” in terms of how it’s intimately attuned to characters trying to find their way in an imbalanced world, it’s also the least violent. Rather than be about the bloody bites of a young woman discovering a taste for human flesh or the more discomforting yet oddly sweet journey of a loner finding a chosen family,...