Parky at the Pictures (DVD 7/12/2017)

While attending a salon in the Prussian capital, Henriette Vogel (Birte Schnoeink) is both shocked and enticed by a recitation given by the poet, playwright and novelist Heinrich von Kleist (Christian Friedel). He is weary of life and tries to convince his cousin Marie (Sandra Hüller) to join him in death. However, she is as uninterested in his proposition as she is in his protestations of undying love and leaves him to mingle with the other guests. Henriette is drawn to Von Kleist and the scandalous reputation of his 1808 novella, The Marquise of O. But she is taken aback when he broaches the subject of suicide, as she leads such a comfortable existence with her husband, Friedrich Louis (Stephan Crossmann), and their daughter, Pauline (Paraschiva Dragus).

Herr Vogel is a civil servant and frequently finds himself having to defend the monarchy's decision to free the serfs and impose taxes upon the aristocracy. His mother-in-law (Barbara Schnitzler) feels particularly betrayed and never misses an opportunity to scold Vogel and curse the French for the revolution that has allowed the lower classes to get ideas above their station. Disliking confrontation, Henriette starts fainting on a regular basis and the local doctor (Holger Handtke) concludes that she is suffering from a nervous condition. When she shows no signs of recovering, however, Vogel consults a mesmerist, who declares that she can only be helped through a lengthy course of treatment. But, when the results come back from a series of medical tests, the doctor announces that Henriette is suffering from an incurable stomach tumour.

Afraid of wasting away and dying in agony, Henriette seeks out Von Kleist and informs him that she is willing to be his partner in death. On discovering the reasons for her decision, however, he is bitterly disappointed and lectures her on the need for purity in her yearning for oblivion. Nevertheless, he accepts her offer and they travel to a country inn with the intention of leaving life while getting back to Nature. But, when they venture out of their room for supper, they are recognised by Adam Müller (Peter Jordan), who engages them in conversation under the impression that they have sought out rural sanctuary for an amorous tryst. Feeling that Müller's presence has cheapened their design, the pair agree to return to the city.

A few days later, Von Kleist bumps into Marie and pleads with her to accept his love and reconsider her decision about ending it all at his side. However, she announces that she has become engaged to a Frenchman and he shares his frustration with his friend, Ernest von Pfuel (Sebastian Hülk). But Von Kleist's situation worsens when his aunt contacts him with the news that she is cancelling the stipend she pays him, as her own finances have been compromised by the death of Queen Luise. Furthermore, his sister tells him that she is also going to stop sending him money, as she doubts his literary talent and believes the time has come for him to earn an honest living. Several weeks pass without Henriette seeing Von Kleist and she complains to her husband that she considers his behaviour to be boorish and immature. Yet, when they meets again at a soirée, Henriette waltzes with Von Kleist, even though Vogel is clearly hurt by her enjoyment. However, even though he informs her that he would not stand in her way if she wanted to be with another man, Vogel remains devoted to his wife and seeks out a surgeon in Paris who could cure her ailment. But Henriette insists she would be too afraid to travel across Europe in such dangerous times and sends word to Von Kleist that she is ready to fulfil his wishes.

They journey together to the Kleiner Wannsee in the depth of winter and go for a walk in the snowy woods. Unnerved by his gravitas, Henriette steels herself to tell Von Kleist that she has changed her mind. But he shoots her anyway and panics when the pistol twice misfires when placed against his temple. Eventually, he finds another weapon and kills himself (off screen). Much to Vogel's distress, the doctor informs him that Henriette's autopsy reveals no sign of an ulcer or tumour and he deduces that she must have died for love. As the film ends, Pauline is accompanied by a pianist in the song about the mystic beauty of the blue mountains that had been her mother's party piece.

Strictly staged as a series of exquisite tableaux and played with admirable restraint, this darkly droll chamber drama approaches the conventions of the heritage saga in much the same way as Jacques Rivette in his adaptation of Balzac's The Duchess of Langeais (2007). The earnest delivery of the often eccentric dialogue could mislead viewers into believing that Hausner is taking this distressing occurrence at face value. But everything from the philosophical musings about deities and destiny to the political discussions about class and taxes is subjected to mild ridicule, as Hausner contrasts the manners and mores of the Napoleonic era with her own morally bankrupt recessional times. Nothing is safe from her withering disdain, as the pampered wife content to be her husbands property has her head turned by a chauvinist dreamer and his notorious novella about a raped marquise.

Yet, there appears to be nothing romantic, let alone sexual about the arrangement into which Henriette enters with Von Kleist and this makes her actions all the more peculiar. Friedel and Schnoeink excel. But Hausner remains so detached from her characters that it's difficult to fathom what is going on inside their heads, although she evidently finds the dynamic between the vacuous waif and the self-absorbed milquetoast to be as amusing as it is perplexing. She risks alienating the audience by imposing such an air of austere artifice on proceedings, but the measured tone perfectly suits the solemnity of the subject matter and the deceptive savagery of the script's wit.

Katharina Woepermann's production design and Tanja Hausner's costumes are impeccable, but it's Martin Gschlacht's rigorous use of a static digital camera to record the action in meticulously composed deep-focus medium shots and telltale close-ups that most catches the eye. Some may feel that Hausner has merely Haneke-ised Jane Austen and failed to build upon the good impression made with Lovely Rita (2001), Hotel (2004) and Lourdes (2009). But this is a work of satirical courage, technical assurance and narrative ingenuity that is laced with so much sardonic comedy and teasing ambiguity that its insights into self-delusion, illiberality, loneliness and social ignorance will linger long after the screening.

This has been a busy period for biopics about famous French painters. Following hard on the heels of Danièle Thompson's Cézanne et Moi and Dorota Kobiela and Hugh Welchman's Loving Vincent comes Édouard Deluc's Gauguin, which draws on the artists 1901 tome, Noa Noa: Voyage to Tahiti, to reflect on his first visit to French Polynesia between 1891-93. But, while this visually evocative picture boasts the kind of elegant fin-de-siècle production values one might expect, Deluc and co-writers Etienne Comar, Thomas Lilti and Sarah Kaminsky adopt such a cavalier attitude to historical truth that this sorry saga not only wilfully misrepresents the nature of Gauguin's sexual appetites, but it also glosses over the harsh realities of French colonial rule and concocts an entirely fictitious ménage in order to whip up some dramatic conflict.

Tired of having to do manual labour on the docks in order to survive because no one is buying his paintings, Paul Gauguin (Vincent Cassel) takes the advance afforded him by his agent and informs his small circle of artistic friends that he intends leaving for French Polynesia in order to live a simpler life and find fresh inspiration. When his Danish wife, Mette (Pernille Bergendorff), informs him that she cannot subject their five children to an uncertain future, Gauguin accuses her of hiding behind her family's bourgeois values. He also listens with little interest as poet Stéphane Mallarmé (Marc Barbé) delivers a farewell oration at a boisterous café gathering that reinforces the sense of ennui that Gauguin feels before he sets sail.

As the rain hammers down outside his cramped quarters, Gauguin paints feverishly by candlelight. He consults sketches and etchings, as he daubs paint on to the canvas, as though inspiration is eluding him and he is finding his new environs to be anything but the paradise he had anticipated. His spirits are dealt a further blow when Mette sends a letter informing him that none of his paintings have sold and that her family has coerced her into terminating their union. Staggering away from the store run by Wei (Jean-Pierre Tchann), where he has run up a considerable tab, the coughing Gauguin collapses on the path and is carried to the clinic in Mataiea by a village youth named Jotepha (Pua-Taï Hikutini), where Henri Vallin (Malik Zidi) tells him that he has suffered a heart attack and that his diabetic condition will deteriorate unless he improves his diet.

Tired of painting on the window, Gauguin discharges himself and entrusts a letter to the doctor, in which he promises Mette that their children will one day be proud of their father. He proceeds on horseback through the jungle and emerges in a sunny upland, where he breathes fresher air and bathes in a waterfall pool. However, his attempts to catch fish with a homemade spear and his rifle are unsuccessful and he is grateful to wind up in a remote settlement, where he wakes to find the children playing with his paints.

Welcomed by Onati (Teiva Manoi) and his wife, Ruita (Tiare Hoata), Gauguin takes the name `Kokay' because they can't pronounce his surname. He also accepts their offer to marry their teenage daughter, Tehura (Tuheï Adams), after she serves them during a meal. Despite her youth, the girl seems to know what she wants and agrees to return with Gauguin to Mataiea. However, having asked if he is a good man, Ruita warns him that Tehura will be free to leave after one cycle of the moon if she discovers the union is not to her liking.

As they ride back across the island, Gauguin shows Tehura the stars and teaches her how to draw. She looks through his sketchbook and finds a photograph of his family, but says nothing about it. One night, she tells him the creation myth of Ta'aroa and he is charmed by her innocence and willingness to learn. He poses her with her chin in her hand and they make love on his rickety bed. But Tehura notices Jotepha fooling around with his friends when she does the laundry in the river and is also taken by the sight of the villagers leaving the missionary church after a service.

Vallin comes to visit and reminds Gauguin that he needs treatment if he is to keep his body going long enough to realise his ambitions. He is impressed with the pictures of Tehura and suggests that she is a Tahitian Venus. Gauguin explains that she has an unspoilt savagery that harks back to the dawn of human time and he is determined to do justice to her beauty. Vallin recognises that Gauguin has tapped into a rich vein of inspiration and agrees to take his paintings to the port. Meanwhile, Gauguin raids the shop for sacks, so that he can keep producing images of Tehura, whose vitality has caught the eye of Jotepha, as he watches her playing with the children who have attached themselves to the grey-bearded stranger.

Revitalised by the sense that he is achieving something worthwhile, Gauguin plays with the children and enjoys the sound of their laughter. But he is taken aback when Tehura asks for a white dress so that she can go to church and he tries to tell her that she doesn't need religion to lead a fully and contented life. However, she is moved by the singing during the service and smiles at Jotepha, as she stands next to him in the pew. Sensing something is developing between them, Gauguin follows the pair into the woods and calls for Jotepha to help him cut some branches, as he has run out of paint and has decided to sculpt in wood in order to stay busy. Fascinated, Jotepha copies Gauguin's hammer and chisel technique, only for the Frenchman to urge him create for himself rather than follow the example of others (which is, of course, essentially what Gauguin is doing in taking inspiration from Tahiti's artefacts and people).

Taking a cart to Papeete, Gauguin lays out his wares in the marketplace and watches the civil servants and their families strolling around the colony's capital as if they owned it. Eventually, a young man wakes Gauguin from his slumbers and haggles down the price for one of the sculptures and he uses the money to buy a white dress for Tehura. He also goes to a café and looks on, as drunken Frenchmen paw at the local girls, with a detestable sense of superiority. By the time he returns to his studio, it's already dark and he finds Tehura naked and face down on the bed, as she is frightened that evil spirits have entered the hut because the candles have gone out. Rather than reassure her, however, Gauguin orders her to hold the pose and begins sketching by lamplight.

With Wei no longer willing to give him credit, Gauguin is forced to go fishing and the locals tease him when he catches three fish with the hook in the lower lip, as this means his wife is unfaithful. Tehura is hurt when he tells her about their suspicions and she is deeply hurt and suggests that his jealousy will fester unless he releases his emotions by striking her. He falls silent at her reproach, but does lash out at Jotepha when he declares that he has producing statues for the white folks to buy, as Gauguin hoped he had taught him to channel his creativity rather than simply churn out tourist trinkets. Shortly afterwards, Tehura suffers a miscarriage and asks Gauguin to take her home. He vows to look after her and, after seeing her sleeping beside Jotepha (and deciding against shooting them), he leaves Mataiea and gets a job hauling sacks on the waterfront in Papeete. Meals with Tehura are taken in silence, as he tries to get back on his feet. But Vallin becomes increasingly concerned for his health and Gauguin receives a communication that he is to be deported back to France as a pauper. He refuses to go and, after he sees Jotepha dressed in a smart suit from the money he makes selling his statues in the market, Gauguin takes to locking Tehura in while he is toiling at the docks. But Jotepha finds her and Gauguin returns home to find the front door has been forced. Yet Tehura is waiting for him and he paints her one last time before taking the boat back to France.

A closing sequence of captions informs us that Gauguin was repatriated by the Ministry of the Interior as `an artist in distress'. However, he exhibited 41 of his Tahitian pictures to mixed reviews in the gallery owned by Paul Durand-Ruel. After spending time in Brittany and in Copenhagen with his family, he visited Tahiti again, as well as the Marquesas, where he painted some of modern art's greatest masterpieces. Yet, he died alone and destitute on 8 May 1903. We see some of these as the credits roll and, interestingly, none of Céline Guignard Rajot's costumes correspond with those shown in the paintings. This is a minor detail, but it rather sums up Deluc's approach to reconstructing history.

No mention is made of the fact that Tehura was just 13 years old when she became Gauguin's companion and some will be disconcerted by the fact that Tuhei Adams, who appears topless in one sequence, is only four years older. But, even if we accept that the events depicted occurred in a very different time and place, it seems disingenuous to overlook such a crucial character trait. However, Deluc and his cohorts are more intent on dissecting the colonial mentality and the legacy of the missionary church than they are in exposing an artistic titan as a syphilitic paedophile.

There's nothing salacious about the scenes centring on the physical side of Gauguin's relationship with Tehura and Vincent Cassel manages to convey a sense of tenderness in a committed performance that often requires him to stare through rheumy eyes at a world that he often feels unworthy to capture. Fewer demands are made on Adams and Pua-Taï Hikutini, who are often required to look beautiful and exotic. Consequently, we learn nothing about their inner lives or what happened to them after Gauguin returned to France. But Deluc has a penchant for presuming considerable foreknowledge and for banking on a lack of audience curiosity.

Yet, while this fragmentary episode fails as biography and drama, Emmanuelle Cuillery's production design is notable, while cinematographer Pierre Cottereau ably contrasts the vibrant colours of the island and the canvases with the half-lit gloom in which Gauguin worked. He also makes effective use of a shallow depth of field to suggest Gauguin's insularity on Tahiti and the narrowness of his focus, as someone who lived to paint and little more. With violin score Warren Ellis's score being sparingly employed during the more sombre moments, this is clearly a heartfelt project. But its subject remains suspect, as do Dulac's motives for insisting on airbrushing him.

The emphasis falls on a father and son in the last of the week's biopics, Jérôme Salle's The Odyssey, a sincere, if essentially superficial account of the strained relationship between explorer, inventor, oceanographer and media personality Jacques-Yves Cousteau and his second son, Philippe. Similar in look and tone to Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg's Thor Heyerdahl biopic, Kon-Tiki (2012), this goes some way to presenting the man behind the Oscar-winning documentaries, The Silent World (1956) and World Without Sun (1964). But, in adapting Jean-Michel Cousteau's memoir, Salle and co-scenarist Laurent Turner have produced a patchwork scenario that attempts to cram in so many events with that there is little room for backstory context or character development.

Opening with the 1979 plane crash that claimed the life of Philippe Cousteau (Pierre Niney), the action flashes back to 1949, as French naval lieutenant Jacques-Yves Cousteau (Lambert Wilson) drives wife Simone (Audrey Tautou), father Daniel (Roger Van Hool) and sons Jean-Michel (Rafaël de Ferran) and Philippe (Ulysse Stein) to the idyllic house by the sea at Sanary near Bandol that he bought with the profits from inventing an aqua-lung. Cousteau takes a boat out into the Côte d'Azur with pals Philippe Tailliez (Laurent Lucas) and Frédéric Dumas (Olivier Galfione) and delight their friends with a screening of the film they shot in the depths of the sea.

Following a garden party, Cousteau takes Simone and the boys diving with breathing apparatus. Jean-Michel is hesitant, but the 10 year-old Philippe proves fearless, as his father shows him the marine life on the sea bed. That night, Cousteau finds Philippe rummaging through his belongings in the shed and gives him his pilot goggles, as he explains how he had to stop flying after he injured his shoulder in a car crash. However, as he tells an audience after a screening with the stammering Tailliez, the sensation of being weightless in the silent depths is the closest humans can come to unpowered flight.

While reading Jules Vernes 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by torchlight to his sons, Cousteau feels inspired to explore the unknown undersea world and cuts a deal with philanthropist Loel Guinness to lease a boat named The Calypso for a peppercorn rent. Simone sells her jewellery to get the vessel restored, with amateur diver Albert `Bebert' Falco (Albert `Bebert' Falco) joining the team after Tailliez suggests Cousteau is mad for giving up a steady wage in uniform to become an adventurer.

However, Cousteau has a plan to fund his expeditions and pays a call on Étienne Deshaies (Thibault de Montalembert) at the Institute of Petroleum. Initially, he seems disinterested in the natural history aspect of Cousteau's scheme. But he needs someone to collect rock samples in a Middle Eastern region marked for offshore drilling and offers free fuel in return for Cousteau's co-operation. Hailing from a family of admirals, Simone is thrilled by this turn of events. But Philippe is furious at being sent to boarding school and ceases to hero-worship his father.

A montage shows Philippe collecting postcards and clippings to stick to the door of his locker, as Cousteau wins the Palme d'Or at Cannes with The Silent World and Falco becomes the first man to live in a house on the ocean floor. Simone shares in these triumphs, as Cousteau lives out his dream. But, while he tries to act cool on rejoining the family in the Red Sea off Sudan in July 1963, Philippe (Niney) can't resist the invitation to go diving and is bowled over by the scientific activity taking place around the submerged base, Precontinent II. Jean-Michel (Benjamin Lavernhe) has decided to take up underwater architecture. But Cousteau is more interested in Philippe's idea for a shot pulling back from a porthole to show the oceanauts in a speck of light in the watery darkness and Simone senses her older boy's resignation to the fact that his sibling will always be their father's favourite.

The image finds its way into The Silent Word, which earns Cousteau more awards and boosts his celebrity to the point that he starts having affairs. Simone finds a love letter in his jacket and takes up permanent residence on The Calypso. But, even though engineer André Laban (Marius Du Plooy) is working on cutting-edge equipment to help the French conquer the seas, money is tight and Cousteau has to meet the wage bill out of his own savings. One night in 1966, however, he notices the televisions twinkling through the windows of the apartments overlooking the Marseille boatyard and he flies to New York to join David Wolper (Adam Neill) in convincing a bunch of executives of the potential of The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau.

While celebrating in a nightclub, Philippe spots Jan (Chloé Hirschman) on the dance floor and instantly falls in love. However, Cousteau has placed him in charge of the TV project and he explains to his HQ workforce that he will be running a tight ship from now on, even though he plans to keep expanding into new areas of inquiry and exploitation. In the Strait of Hormuz in 1967, Philippe gets into a fight with Falco after endangering a party of four divers while filming a shiver of sharks and Simone begins to wonder if he is either getting distracted by Jan or becoming too big for his boots.

Cousteau flies in (now wearing his trademark red bobble hat) to introduce the crew's new marine biologist, Eugenie Clark (Chloé Williams). But her presence upsets Simone, while Philippe is embarrassed when his father prevents him from taking over the control of a private plane, even though he has qualified for his pilot's licence. Needing someone to plan the expeditions while he forges deals on land and does the chat show circuit, Cousteau brings Jean-Michel back into the fold as his logistics chief. But Philippe's growing disillusion is exacerbated by a growing concern for conservation that is sparked by watching the cook tossing non-biodegradable rubbish over the side of the Calypso.

Things come to a head in Cape Town in March 1968, when Philippe objects to the capture of two seals so that Falco can make a film about their wacky interaction with the crew. Cousteau can't see the problem, even when the creatures begin fighting in their confined cage and Simone refuses to intervene when Philippe accuses his father of selling out and Disneyfying animals without the first thought for their well-being. He returns to Jan, who is modelling in New York. They marry in Paris, with Jean-Michel being the only family member present. Simone confides in Falco that she is jealous of her husbands mistresses, but she refuses to leave Calypso and accepts the pain as a worthwhile price for her freedom.

A montage shows Cousteau hurtling between his commitments, while explaining to accountant Henri Plé (Martin Loizillon) how much he needs someone to keep the organisation on an even keel. But his life remains a whirl and he fails to attend his father's funeral. While Philippe and Jan film whales as part of an eco project off Baja California, Mexico in November 1971, Plé breaks the news that Cousteau is $20 million in debt. When Deshaies severs his ties, he is forced to lay off loyal workers like Laban. However, Simone convinces him not to sell The Calypso and, when a wonky shelf breaks in his cabin, he picks up a copy of Verne and hatches a plan to explore Antarctica. The US network only advances him $1 million and he recklessly decides his wooden-hulled tub would be just as good as an ice breaker.

Cousteau meets Philippe in a New York café and tries to persuade him to join the expedition. But, while he still admires his father, Philippe has long stopped trusting him and he condemns his selfishness before admitting that he would rather have had another father. Shrugging, Cousteau leaves with his latest conquest. Yet, as the crew loads up Calypso in the port of Ushuaia on Tierra del Fuego in December 1972, Philippe arrives on the quay and is welcomed with open arms.

The expedition gets off to an inauspicious start when they discover that whalers have decimated the school and killed those detailed to protect them. They bury the dead and head into choppy waters. But they make it to land in one piece and begin capturing unique footage of sea leopards, penguins and sea lions. They celebrate Christmas at the foot of the world and a montage of breathtaking snowscapes and underwater sequences convinces Cousteau that he needs to stop thinking about conquering the oceans and start protecting them.

Wolper is aghast because he knows TV stations rely on the petro-advertising dollar. But Cousteau is as good as his word and he tours the chat shows, while Philippe finds a sea plane to speed their mission. They dub it Calypso II and soon Jean-Michel and Plé are receiving large donations to fund the initiative. However, as their movement begins to swell, the action leaps forward to 28 June 1989, as Philippe asks his daughter over the phone if she would like a baby brother before he takes off on his doomed flight in Portugal. As we see Cousteau's old flying goggle rising to the surface, he calls Falco to make sure Simone doesn't hear the news on the radio before her son's body is found. He asks her to teach him about classical music, but she senses something is wrong and is angry with Falco for not playing straight with her.

Cousteau is ready to quit. But Jean-Michel reminds him that he implored them as children to live to the full and he smiles at the son he had so often neglected in gratitude for reminding him. A closing shot of Cousteau photographing his grandchildren underwater fades to a caption revealing that his work as an environmentalist led to a moratorium on the exploitation of Antarctica until 2048. However, as the ice cap melts and the capitalist superpowers realise what resources are available, humanity needs to be more vigilant than ever in protecting is fragile planet.

While it means well and there is no doubting the conviction of Cousteau's eco-conversion, this closing message feels a little tacked on to provide a hook for modern audiences. Moreover, it conveniently forgets the role that Cousteau played early in his career in abetting the French petroleum industry. But there is also no question that the films and TV shows he produced inspired generations of future marine scientists and conservationists. Thus, one can understand Salle's desire to skate over some of the less attractive aspects of Cousteau's character and the sacrifices that others had to make in order to allow him to realise his dreams.

Yet, despite Salle's credit sequence claim to have conducted exhaustive research and extensive interviews with those who knew Cousteau, this never feels like an in-depth profile and rarely comes close to explaining why he is revered as the Gallic equivalent of David Attenborough. It may resist being entirely hagiographical, but it's rarely dramatically compelling, as Salle and Turner skip between key incidents that are often prompted by coincidences or contrivances that would be ridiculed in a fictional film. For the most part, therefore, the cast is buffeted along and only rarely gets to explore the psychological state of their characters. Aided by some adept make-up effects, Lambert Wilson looks the part and exudes a certain single-minded dignity. But Audrey Tautou is wasted as Simone Melchior (whose ageing is signified by a succession of grey wigs), while Pierre Niney is asked to do little more than grow a period and periodically look either frustrated and forgiving.

Unusually, Alexandre Desplat's score leaves little to the audience's emotional imagination, as it alternately douses scenes in wonderment and mawkishness. Credit must go to production designer Laurence Ott, however, although his splendidly authentic sets are upstaged by the magnificent terrestrial and underwater photography of Mathias Bouchard and Peter Zuccarini. But, even here, Salle decides to tinker and use CGI to augment certain scenes (although admittedly understandably in the case of the shark attack) when, if Jacques Cousteau taught us anything, it's that our world is at its most majestic when it's at its most natural.

Having made a decent job of reviving an old tele-favourite in Belle and Sebastien (2013), experienced documentarist Nicolas Vanier returns with School of Life, another period piece that harks back to the 1920s for a rite of passage that feels as though it should have been adapted from a beloved childhood novel. Co-scripted by Jérôme Tonnerre and set in Sologne in north-central France, the story calls to mind Jean Renoir's La Règle du jeu (1939), as it pits a poacher against a gamekeeper on a large country estate. But, rather than being a biting indictment of the class system at a time when La Patrie was dancing on the edge of a volcano, this is a rose-tinted recreation that allows a town mouse to discover his destiny in a rugged rustic setting.

Summoned to an orphanage in Paris in 1927, Valérie Karsenti is so shocked by the slap that the director gives to young Jean Scandel in the dormitory that she agrees to foster him for the summer on the vast country estate where she works as a maid. The boy remains politely sullen on the train journey to the Loiret and is reluctant to call Karsenti `maman', even though she claims that they are related because she is the son of her cousin's nephew.

Taken by the yard abutting Karsenti's cottage, Scandel is horrified when she turns the rabbit he had been stroking into supper and he is stopped from opening the hutches to release the others by her gruff gamekeeper husband, Eric Elmosnino. He takes Scandel to feed the hunting hounds belonging to Count François Berléand and warns him to steer clear of François Cluzet, a roguish poacher who belongs behind bars. However, Karsenti insists he is a nice chap and shows Scandel the rickety boat on the river he calls home.

Intrigued by someone who refuses to play by the rules, Scandel watches Cluzet fishing and dives into rescue his little dog, Boy (who is female), when she is swept away by the current. Yet, while he lets Scandel dry out on his gadget-laden boat, Cluzet suspects that he is spying for Elmosnino and orders him to stay away. That night, however, Scandel sees Karsenti put a towel out to dry in the window as a signal to Cluzet after Elmosnino goes on his rounds and he threatens to expose their dalliance unless Cluzet agrees to let him tag along on his scavenging route through the woods.

The poacher teaches the boy how to read animal tracks and shows him how he uses reversible soles on his boots to keep Elmosnino guessing about his movements. They hide behind a rock, as Berléand rides with his hounds in pursuit of stags and reprimands Elmosnino for wasting his energies on Cluzet when he has no objection to him taking the odd rabbit when they are overrun with the creatures and reminds him that he has no time for fences on his land. During a simple lunch of bread and sausage, Cluzet captures a snake slithering through the undergrowth and tells Scandel about the warning chirrups of the warblers that keep watch over the woodland.

Karsenti is content for Scandel to spend his time with Cluzet, even though they often get up to mischief by stealing Frédéric Saurel's barrow when he stops for a nap and hoisting it up in a tree. But she reminds him not to let Elmosnino see them together. She also tells him to keep out of the manor house, as Berléand detests children. But Scandel can't resist sneaking through an open door and he is looking at the animal trophies on the staircase when Berléand spots him. He seems to accept Karsenti's reassurance that it won't happen again. But, when she informs her husband that Scandel's father was killed during the Great War, Elmosnino suspects she is not telling the whole truth, especially when she proves so evasive whenever the boy's mother is mentioned.

Cluzet shows Scandel how to tie a fishing fly and stations him on a bridge over the river to guide his casting in pursuit of a large salmon. They succeed in snaring the fish and Scandel is decorated with the lure on his pullover for catching it in his net. During lunch, Cluzet dismisses religion and curses the arrival of some Gypsy caravans, as he hates the way they steal from Berléand. When Scandel points out that he does the same thing, Cluzet gives him a glass of wine to change the subject and he is still feeling a little tiddly when Karsenti serves her husband a plate of trotters and ears that causes the boy to flee from the table with his hand over his mouth.

While Karsenti is at the market tearing a strip off Cluzet for getting a child drunk, Scandel fishes in a shady bend of the river. He fails to hear Ilona Cabrera sneaking up behind him and hiding his pail and, when he turns to see her skipping away through the long grass, he is immediately enchanted by her. Following her to the camp, he watches her dance when Berléand comes to greet the Gypsy king, Affif Ben Badra. He is still thinking about her when Elmosnino catches him laying traps with Cluzet's knife and he is frogmarched back to the cottage, where Elmosnino warns Karsenti that Scandel will be dispatched back to Paris unless he behaves. Moreover, he informs Cluzet that Scandel has welched on him and vows to use his evidence in front of a judge.

Concerned rather than intimidated, Cluzet goes about his business and chats to Berléand when he finds him gathering mushrooms. The count has taken a shine to Scandel since they discussed stags on the trophy staircase and they the boy mentioned seeing a fabled 18-point monarch roaming the grounds. But Karsenti has to keep reminding Scandel to mind his Ps and Qs and scolds him when he claims to have seen Berléand's daughter riding her horse in the woods, as she died many years ago and the mere mention of her name pains the old gentleman. Yet Berléand confides to Cluzet that Scandel reminds him of someone and they agree that it's a shame that Elmosnino has clamped down on him and made him start school.

Upset by Elmosnino's lie that he has squealed on his friend, Scandel readily conspires with Karsenti when Elmosnino announces that he is going out to catch him poaching with lamps. While Karsenti gets Elmosnino drunk and lures him into the bedroom, Scandel goes in search of Cluzet, who upbraids him for sneaking up on him in the dark, as he could easily have taken a bullet. He is grateful for the warning, however, and sends Scandel home with Saurel.

Shortly afterwards, Scandel breaks into the desk drawer where Karsenti keeps her secret things and reads a letter from a woman with the same name as his late mother. He asks if Karsenti's friend is her mother, but she is too flustered to reply and he goes in search of Saurel, who might know about someone named Mathilde, as he has spent his entire life on the estate. The kindly peasant recalls giving a young girl a ride in his barrow many years before, but she died and this revelation prompts Scandel to visit the small churchyard, where he finds a tombstone bearing his mother's name. Cluzet finds him sitting beside the grave and advises the boy to focus on living to the full rather than fretting about the past, as life passes far too quickly.

Berléand's wastrel son, Thomas Durand, comes for a visit with some bright young friends and the old man seeks sanctuary in the stables. Scandel asks about an ailing white horse in one of the stalls and, when Berléand reveals that nobody has ridden it since his daughter died, Scandel tells him his surname and the count falls to the floor in shock. He is grateful to Karsenti for bringing the boy home, but nothing more is said about the matter, as rumours have spread about the monarch returning to its glen and Berléand and Elmosnino are bent on catching it.

After reading an essay he has written about the stag, Scandel's teacher, Murielle Huet des Aunay, implores him to say nothing of its whereabouts, as she thinks it's a noble creature and that it would be a crime if someone shot it for sport. Fortunately, Berléand feels the same way after a lengthy chase that sees the stag lose the hounds by wading through the river. Cluzet brings the news to Scandel at the school gates and Huet des Aunay joins them in gazing on the beast, as it recovers from its exertions. But Berléand is thrown from his horse while riding home and, while he is bedridden, Durand determines to bag the trophy for himself and orders Elmosnino to flush it out with the hounds. When the gamekeeper protests in front of Durand's friends, he is reminded of his place with a sneer before the party goes out to shoot geese.

When Durand kills a heron by mistake, Cabrera puts a hex on him and he drives to the Gypsy camp and orders them to leave. When Ben Badra protests, Durand informs him that things will be different when he inherits the estate and Scandel learns from Cabrera's grandmother, Claudine Baschet, that the count had always protected them because he had been in love with a Gypsy girl in his youth. His parents had forced them apart and, as Karsenti tells Scandel when he gets home, he had made the same mistake with his daughter, after she had fallen in love with a railroad navvy. They had eloped to Paris, where Scandel had been born shortly after his father had died in the trenches. But the doctors had been unable to save his mother and he had been sent to an orphanage because Berléand couldn't live with the shame of his actions.

He has time to apologise to Scandel for betraying his mother and Karsenti takes him to the lakeside chapel where she is buried. But, no sooner has Berléand passed away than Durand starts to throw his weight around. In addition to fencing off the property to keep intruders out, he declares his ambition to kill the monarch, as it was partly responsible for his father's death. Cluzet is appalled by both decisions, as fencing the estate will restrict the movement of larger animals. But, while Elmosnino dislikes Durand, he has his job to do and he dons his scarlet hunting tunic and blows his horn to guide the pack. However, when Cluzet fires at Durand as he takes aim at the stag, Elmosnino pushes him over when he tries to shoot the poacher. Moreover, he smiles with pride when Scandel leads the hounds away and the old foes even manage to exchange a joke when Durand fires his gamekeeper.

But Durand has a surprise in store when a lawyer arrives to read Berléand's will, as not only has he granted the Gypsies free access in perpetuity to the estate, but he has also left the manor to Scandel, leaving Durand in sole possession of a vinegar factory in Orleans to provide a modest income. As Karsenti and Elmosnino have also been given the deeds to their cottage, everyone is happy, including Cluzet, who is also made a gamekeeper and, as the film ends, he joins with his employer and neighbours to steer some wild boar away from the crops and vineyard.

Despite the hazy glow over this closing sequence and the wildlife images accompanying the credits, it's hard to ignore the fate that awaits the population of this part of France in just 13 years time. But Vanier clearly intends this to be a happy ending, in which the locals are able to retain a stake in their land rather than have it pass to a feckless playboy who would exploit it solely for his own benefit. The political resonance of such a viewpoint is merely tangential, however, as Vanier and Tonnerre invoke the spirit of Marcel Pagnol for purely nostalgic purposes.

At times, they allow their tale to meander and don't strive particularly hard to guard its secrets. Moreover, they pack too much contrivance into the final third, with Durand being a feebly one-dimensional villain. Cluzet and Elmosnino's well-matched adversaries are far more rounded, but even they slip into the background, as Scandel concentrates on uncovering the truth about his ancestry. Indeed, only the kindly Karsenti remains a constant, as the photogenic youth rises to his rightful place. Yet, even this Gallic Fauntleroy is rather sketchily limned, as his rough city edges slide away and he grows increasingly to the manor born.

As one might expect of a heritage picture of this kind, the production values are admirable, with Éric Guichard's views of the house and grounds almost giving the action a fairytale feel. Production designer Sébastian Birchler does a nice job of the gamekeeper's cottage and the poacher's boat, while Adélaïde Gosselin's costumes stop well short of shabby chic. Similarly, Armand Amar's gentle orchestral score resists the temptation to gild the engagingly restrained narrative with emotional swirls. Consequently, while it may be overly cosy in its evocation of both time and place, this should find a ready audience among those raised on Sunday evening serials.

Guadeloupe-born comedian Éric Judor is best known for his collaboration with Ramzy Bedia in comic romps like Charles Nemes's Don't Die Too Hard! (2001) and Philippe Haim's Lucky Luke and the Daltons (2004). The pair co-directed Seuls Two (2008), while Judor took the helm alone for La Tour 2 contrôle infernale (2016). But there's no sign of Bedia in Problemos, which sees Judor star and direct in an end-of-days scenario scripted by Noé Debré and Blanche Gardin. Proving conclusively that jokes don't always translate or travel well, this satire on New Age ideologies gets off to a rocky start and flounders around in an increasingly tiresome bid to find something to ruffle, if not exactly offend everyone.

Éric Judor is far from happy that wife Célia Rosich has talked him into spending a weekend at the alternative community where her former yoga teacher, Michel Nabokoff, resides. The couples teenage daughter, Marie Helmer, is even more annoyed when she is forced to hand over her tablet because all electronic gadgets are banned from the site because one of the group suffers from electro-sensitivity. When Helmer makes a scene and screams, Judor unleashes a torrent of verbal abuse that results in everyone staring at him and he takes an immediate dislike to Nabokoff when he patronises him.

Once this prologue is completed, Act One, `The Best Tomatoes in the Region', begins with Helmer creating another commotion when she refuses to play with young Zakaria Benyahya and his mother, Blanche Gardin, makes it clear that she disapproves of Judor and his attitude towards their retreat. While Helmer is allowed to leave the perimeter for 15 minutes to calm down with her tablet, Judor and Rosich go for a walk around an area of wetland that the group is bent on stopping becoming a water park. Suddenly, riot police appear and fire tear gas into the compound. A local activist urges them to negotiate rather than blockade themselves in. But Dorothée Pousséo peels off her top and dances in defiance, while her friends chant `resistance' and `revolution' at the cops.

Needing some time to himself, Judor slips away from the family and bumps into Nabokoff's 16 year-old bikini-clad daughter, Claire Chust, who has come for a two-week visit. She asks Judor to fetch some cooking-oil from the kitchen to help her tan and he hurries back to the camp with a leering grin on his face. However, no sooner has he started massaging Chust's back than Helmer appears with her tablet and starts filming her father in compromising action. Nabokoff also comes through the undergrowth and chides Chust for wasting precious foodstuffs.

Having escaped censure, Judor finds himself upsetting the group again at dinner, when he shouts at a dog that has stolen his chicken. He is reprimanded by Marc Fraize and his adoring wife Blandine Ruiz for not treating animals with due respect, as they roamed the planet before humans and we should be grateful to them for allowing us to share their home. But the disdain is even more vehement when Judor mocks Gardin's song-filled seminar on alternatives to sanitary towels and he is branded a chauvinist oaf. Fraize becomes emotional while calling for gender equality and Gardin and Pousséo rip into Judor again when Rosich complains about having to wax her bikini line. They suggest that he should abandon outdated proprietorial attitudes and suggest he embraces polyamory. Rosich shoots him a dirty look when he doesn't dismiss this proposal out of hand and Judor is once again subjected to criticism when he flinches at an elderly woman offering her services.

At that moment, they are summoned to the barricade, as the police cordon has been lifted and Nabokoff is suspicious that the authorities are trying to catch them off their guard. He suggests that they put on a show of harmony and Rosich enters into the spirit by announcing that they are going to stay for a fortnight. Judor is horrified, but his protests are shouted down by Fraize, who urges them to shun the `Babylonian' urban bubble, in which supermarkets have no exits and crisps have artificially added crunchiness.

Judor is wondering what on earth he is talking about when Chust pipes up that everyone on Twitter is discussing `panda mix'. Snatching the phone, Judor realises that the hot topic is a pandemic that has wiped out millions of people since spreading from Venezuela. They deduce that this is probably why the cops have vanished and Nabokoff, Fraize and Eddy Leduc volunteer to go to the nearby village of Lantenay to investigate.

Venturing into the outside world, they drive slowly along the country lane until they come to a pile of dead bodies beside a road block. Fraize goes to check on them and promptly collapses, leaving Nabokoff to console the grieving Ruiz. Gardin is criticised for dismissing everything on social media as drivel, but reasserts her position when Nabokoff declares the next morning to be the first day of the New World and she brands it `Oonday the krisken of Tarkoon'. A despairing Judor begins to feel he is surrounded by idiots and fears for the worst when Nabokoff's suggestion that they should abandon all imposed laws and start making their own is approved by a show of jazz hands.

This decision takes us into Act Two, `Tonight You Don't Sleep in the Tent', which opens with a `circle of speech' discussion about the sleeping arrangements. However, Leduc is unhappy that Youssef Hajdi has returned from a foraging expedition in the woods and everyone takes cover in a large tent until Hajdi agrees to undergo a period of quarantine to prove he isn't contaminated. As Nabokoff knows the virus kills instantaneously, such precautions seem preposterous. But no one is prepared to take a chance and they also insist that shaman Bun Hay Mean should also remain outside the sanctuary because he smells.

While preparing dinner, Rosich and Pousséo upset Gardin by inquiring about Benyahya's gender and she claims that she has no right to impose a personality upon her child. But the camp is disturbed soon afterwards by the sound of loud music and everyone is astonished to discover that Hajdi has built himself a magnificent treehouse. They are impressed that he has made his own glass window and, as they prowl round by storm lantern, they realise that he has also erected a windmill to generate power. As Bun sleeps beneath the stilts on which the edifice rests, Hajdi invites his neighbours to see what they can find at the dump, as the kind of gadgets they had forsworn might come in useful.

Leduc finds two sheep and announces that he intends raising a flock. However, everyone is too hungry to consent to his plan and he draws on the killing skills learned on duty in Syria to slaughter one of the animals for the communal table. After supper, Pousséo announces that the meat has given her a blood rush and Gardin's brother, Arnaud Henriet, takes up her offer of some canoodling. But the siblings fall out when Henriet sees nothing wrong in Chust using the exercise bike that Hajdi has attached to his water heater and shows a little too much interest in the moans of ecstasy that the teenager emits while having a hot shower.

Furious when Henriet accuses her of being a repressed lesbian, Gardin asks Nabokoff to reprimand her brother and force him into doing some chores. Meanwhile, Leduc has also been seduced by the prospect of getting clean and he agrees to paint Hajdi's windows in return for some hot water. His bellows of pleasure also ring around the camp and Gardin accuses Hajdi of sex slavery before she begins bickering with Henriet again.

Concerned by these internal divisions, Nabokoff goes to see Hajdi at the start of Act Three, `That Wasn't Our Conception of Society.' Once inside the house, however, Nabokoff is mightily impressed and also takes a shower. As he returns to the camp, he bumps into Judor, who is puzzled why Chust is talking to a tree. Nabokoff explains that he convinced his daughter to come and stay by informing her that she would be on a reality TV show and that she thinks cameras are embedded in some of the trees. Spotting an opportunity to exploit the naive teen, Judor tells her that he is from the network and can guarantee that she will get more viewer votes that Pousséo if she sleeps with him.

Unsure what to do for the best, Chust seeks out Bun, who is spaced out on datura. He makes some dubious remarks about black men that echo Hajdi's earlier comments about Asians before slipping into a fatal coma. The group hold a funeral service and float Bun's body down river on a decorated bier. However, Gardin blames Hajdi for failing to keep an eye on him and the others tell her to cut Hajdi some slack as he is entitled to live as he pleases. Moreover, they have all benefited from his generosity. But his little fiefdom survives no longer than Leduc, who gets swept away while trying to free Bun's bier from some rocks, as Benyahya causes a fire by throwing a stone through the window and Gardin has to stop Hajdi from throttling her child.

Disowned by the others, Hajdi leaves the camp and Fraize's ghost appears to advise Nabokoff to go north in searching for him. No one joins the expedition, however, so Judor mooches around the compound in a bid to determine whether Benyaliya is male or female. Unfortunately, Gardin catches him in the act and denounces him as a pervert. Chust also accuses him of trying to groom her and Gardin seizes the opportunity to call an election for new leadership. Judor is dismayed when Rosich abandons Nabokoff to support Gardin and stalks into the wilds to find Hajdi. He has taken up residence in a hole in the ground and has concocted a taser to catch rabbits. Still smarting with Gardin, Judor borrows the device to teach her a lesson and finds her trying to persuade Leduc to sleep with her so they can save the species.

Having incapacitated Gardin, Judor puts her behind bars. But, when Chust finds Nabokoff's head on a spike in the woods, he realises that a rival gang of feral survivors must be on the rampage and releases Gardin to negotiate with them, as camp leader. As her friends watch from the bushes, Gardin is seized and butchered by the ringleaders and they blame Judor for her death. They demand he comes up with a plan of action, but he can think of nothing other than a wall to protect them.

He tries to boost morale with a speech about honouring the memory of those lost. But he forgets to mention Fraize, whose ghost warns against the evils of war. As everyone starts singing `Lollipop' by The Chordettes. Victor smiles at the peaceful sentiments of these well-intentioned kooks. But he insists that their only hope of survival lies in wasting their foe and the picture ends with a bravura assault on the marauders' camp.

During the closing credits, a cutaway reveals that Judor was in the process of coercing Chust into sleeping with him when she found her father's head on a spike. Designed to sign off on one last near-the-knuckle gag, it merely serves to remind us how ill-judged this entire enterprise is. The risible storyline, crass caricatures and lazy satire are bad enough, but the incessant sexism and throwaway racist banter are unpardonable and it adds to the sense of unease that Blanche Gardin helped write the script.

The performances are spirited, while cinematographer Vincent Muller conveys something of the camp's aura. But the only notable contribution comes from production designer Arnaud Roth, who revels in filling Hajda's luxury retreat with quirky mod cons. Little else about this resistibly smug farrago will linger long in the memory, however.

A graduate of café-théâtre, television and stand-up comedy, Florence Foresti has spent a decade taking offbeat character parts in such local releases as Anne-Marie Étienne's Si c'était lui... (2007) and Éric Lavaine's Barbecue (2014). But she demonstrates that she has the personality and presence to carry a weighty drama in costume designer Anne-Gaëlle Daval's directorial debut, De Plus Belle, which examines how women who have beaten cancer come to terms with how they and other people see their bodies.

Despite having been told she is in remission from breast cancer, 40 year-old Lyon single mother Florence Foresti is struggling to throw herself into a night of clubbing with her friends and younger sister, Olivia Bonamy. Feeling uncomfortable in a long, black wig, she slips outside and calls doctor brother Jonathan Cohen at one in the morning to make an urgent appointment, so that he can reassure her that she really is clear after a four-year battle.

On returning to the nightclub, Foresti dismisses the attention of handsome stranger Mathieu Kassovitz, as she thinks he is far too young for her and has only come over to flirt with Bonamy. When he insists that he is interested in her, Foresti explains that she isn't looking for a man at the moment, especially one with a talent to amuse and infuriate her at the same time.

Later that morning, Cohen confirms that Foresti is cured and suggests that having a love affair might be a good way of channelling her energies now that she doesn't have to focus on beating a disease. Foresti declares that she has enough to do raising teenage daughter Jeanne Astier. But she is less than impressed when her mother buys her a box of tampons as a gift to celebrate becoming a woman and informs Foresti that her wig makes her look like Morticia Addams. The next day, therefore, Foresti ventures into a chic wig shop run by Nicole Garcia, who gives her a makeover and reminds her that 7/10ths of anyone's beauty is made up on refinements.

Pleased with her new look, Foresti shows it to her fussy florist mother, Josée Drevon, while they work on the bouquets for a funeral. She thinks that Foresti should think less about herself and could benefit from confronting some real problems by joining her in volunteering to help the poor. Trying to remain civil, Foresti is almost relieved to get a phone call from Kassovitz and agrees to a date when she can't think of enough credible excuses to put him off.

On her way home, she returns the bobbed wig to Garcia. However, she is in her upstairs studio giving a body image seminar to a group of middle-aged women who are required to gaze at themselves in a mirror while caressing their faces and arms in an effort to remind themselves what it felt like to be beautiful and desired. As she is too timid to leave, Foresti finds herself in the line-up, as Garcia urges the class to reclaim themselves as women. Initially, she feels self-conscious. But, as she looks around at women of all ages, shapes and sizes, she begins to relax and enjoy the sensation.

The next day, Foresti teeters along some cobbles in a pair of turquoise heels and waits for Kassovitz outside a café. When he arrives on a motorbike, however, he tells her that there has been a change of plan and hands her a helmet. Clambering on to the back of the bike, Foresti clings on, as Kassovitz heads for the retirement home where his grandmother lives. Perrette Souplex adores Kassovitz and reassures Foresti that he's a good boy really. They go to the canteen for lunch, where Souplex informs friends Michel Charell and Claude Leveque that Kassovitz is an expert when it comes to women and that they should listen to his tips. He tells them to look around and urges them to read the body language of the female residents, as they want to feel affection as much as they do.

Foresti confirms that women like to be touched and she smiles at Kassovitz for making Souplex and her pals feel so good about themselves. However, the amorous mood is shattered when one of the seniors blows his nose loudly and Kassovitz despairs at the talent he has to work with. On arriving home, Foresti thanks him for a fun day and tries to hand back the helmet. But he urges her to keep it, as it's going to come in useful.

Unsure of her feelings, Foresti says nothing about Kassovitz to Drevon, who is trying to set her up with a gap-toothed organist at her church. She criticises her daughter for working too slowly in their nursery greenhouse and suggests that she takes a leaf out of Bonamy's book. But Foresti loses her temper and says she is tired of being compared with her beautiful sister and wishes that people would realise that she can't pass a reflective surface without being reminded of her own deficiencies.

Needing a confidence boost, therefore, she returns to Garcia's workshop and dons a tight black vest, leggings and strappy heels to shuffle, stomp, shout and clasp her elbows in an exercise designed to channel aggression into strength. During the cool-down session, Garcia informs the class that she intends to put on a show that will require them to learn striptease techniques. However, Foresti refuses to undress in public, especially if her mother is in the audience. But Garcia reassures her that it will be an empowering experience and the rest of the group seem keen to give it a try.

That night, Astier helps Foresti choose a dress to return the crash helmet to Kassovitz. She takes a ferry to his part of town and he is disappointed that she has brought the helmet back. He makes tea and jokes that he has a `listening and sympathy' routine that is guaranteed to lure women into bed. Forest admits that she hasn't been with anyone for three years and dances with him when he puts Joe Cocker's `You Are So Beautiful' on the stereo. Kassovitz lifts her off the floor and Foresti clings to him. But, she feels the need to take stock in the bathroom and emerges to tease Kassovitz about the number of products he has purchased from the shopping channel. He protests that he is an insomniac and has bought tons of gym equipment and kitchen appliances he simply doesn't need.

At that moment, his grandmother calls to ask if he has snapped up any bargains and Foresti is touched by the fact that he has purchased magic sweepers and wonder massagers to maintain a connection with Souplex. However, she backs away when Kassovitz tries to put an arm around her and feels flustered as she says her goodbyes. Sitting on the quayside, Foresti wonders what to do, as she likes Kassovitz, but doesn't feel ready to let him see (and judge) her body.

Seeking reassurance, she makes an appointment with Cohen and ribs him about a nurse who clearly has a crush on him. He insists he is too busy with his family for any distractions and Forest is surprised when the lunchtime discussion among Garcia's class turns to relationships. They have moved into a larger hall with a stage and Foresti is appalled when Garcia shows up with bodybuilder Victor Chambon and cleaner Alexander Michel, who will be their audience for their first-time strips. Farida Ouchani, Sabine Pakora, Claudette Walker, Murelle Boura, Sarah Espour and Angélique Vergara all seem up for the challenge, however, and the elderly Walker is the first to take the plunge.

Gripped by panic, Foresti rushes into the washroom to compose herself. She wants to run away, but knows that she needs to face up to her situation and she emerges with renewed resolve and, even though Chambon keeps his head on the table, she feels proud of herself when Michael joins her classmates in applauding her routine. Buoyed by the experience, she meets Kassovitz for ice cream beside the river. She asks why he collects girls and he reveals that he was teased at school for having a nose like Nicolas Sarkozy and now feels better about himself. Forest examines his nose and compliments him and he kisses her as the sun sets over the city.

Just as she starts to feel she has turned a corner, however, Foresti learns that her cancer has returned. Cohen lies beside her to comfort her and suggests that she has a double mastectomy. Foresti tries to put on a brave face and requests implants like Angelina Jolie's. She also recalls how her brother had climbed into her bed during childhood storms and he urges her to be brave because things could get pretty frightening. When Kassovitz calls round, however, she refuses to answer the door without her wig, even when he claims that he wants to know everything about her. Eventually, her silence prompts him to give up and Foresti slumps to the floor in self-pity.

She also tells Garcia that she is pulling out of the show. But she gives Foresti a pep talk and suggests that she should view her striptease as a farewell celebration of her breasts. Reluctantly, Forest agrees to stay with the group, but she is still feeling fragile when Bonamy criticises her for not pulling her weight at work. Fuming that she is entitled to a private life, Bonamy leaves her sister to cash up alone. Taking advantage of the space in the darkened greenhouse, Forest practices her striptease and removes her bra just as Bonamy returns to apologise. She is upset because she knows that her husband is cheating on her and they ponder the male fascination with breasts after Foresti explains what she is doing and why.

The sisters hug, as Bonamy offers to swap bodies and they meet up again a few days later for a family lunch. Cohen chides Foresti for keeping the news from Drevon and she promises to broach the subject while cooking. However, she storms off when Drevon criticises her for snapping too many green beans and she sits with niece Zoe Laroche, while she draws herself as a princess. Trying to make conversation, Cohen asks about Kassovitz and Foresti confesses that she broke up with him to avoid him learning the truth about her illness. Asking Drevon to make his favourite French fries to distract her, Cohen dispatches his sister to make up with Kassovitz. But, as they chat in his living-room, a girl descends the stairs in her underwear and Foresti leaves an invitation to the show on the sideboard before taking her leave.

Returning to the lunch table, Forest finds herself having to defend Astier when Drevon criticises her for wearing make-up and a t-shirt with a blasphemous slogan. However, her ire switches to Cohen's teenage daughter, Lorraine Thebault, who is stoned after smoking a joint on the garden swing. Cohen tries to keep the peace, but Foresti congratulates Astier for having the confidence to express herself at 15 and wishes that she had been able to do the same.

After lunch, however, Foresti attempts to patch things up and tells Drevon that the cancer has returned. She asks why her mother had stopped her from attending ballet classes as a child and she insists that she had only been trying to spare her taunts, as she had been so podgy and the other girls would have been merciless. Foresti persists and inquires whether Drevon thinks she's ugly. But she explains that she looks like her late father and reveals that she had never understood why such a handsome man would have chosen someone as plain as she was. She had spent their entire married life waiting for him to betray her and she had deeply resented how insecure this made her feel. Yet, he had remained faithful until his dying day and she now values Forest because she is such a clear reminder of the man she had loved.

Touched by the idea that she has a filial duty to keep her father's spirit alive, Foresti commits to the show. As she puts on a blue feathered head-dress with the audience taking its seats, however, she gets a phone call from Astier saying that she is stranded at a bus stop in the sticks and needs picking up. Promising Garcia that she will be back in time, Foresti goes to find her daughter, who explains that she had refused to sleep with her boyfriend when she went to study at his house and he had thrown her out. Proud her Astier for standing up for herself, Foresti calls Cohen to collect them. He already has Bonamy and Drevon in the car and the latter has to intervene when the sisters start bickering about Cohen's driving. Bonamy complains that Cohen is Drevon's favourite and Foresti pulls a face when her mother insists that she loves them all equally.

Arriving back at the venue, Foresti rejoins her fellow performers, as her family shuffle into their seats. The lights dim and `Gopher Mambo' plays over the speakers, as Foresti appears in a jungle setting as a bird of paradise. The others strut their stuff about the stage and remove their bustiers. But, just as everyone unhooks their bras and turns their back on the audience, Foresti spots Kassovitz lurking at the rear of the auditorium. Facing front, she pulls off her wig to reveal her bald scalp and Drevon applauds her courage and confides to Astier that she saw a lot worse when she was at boarding school. Foresti beams with relief at having survived this ordeal, but she sees Kassovitz slip away and doesn't expect to see him again, as she accepts the congratulations of her family in the foyer.

Some time later, Foresti is on a hospital ward waiting for her operation. Cohen arrives with a wheelchair and promises he will ensure she gets the full Jolie treatment. Cohen reprimands them for being vulgar and they make her smile by taunting her for being such a strict and disapproving mother. Before they set off, Cohen places the wig on his sister's head and they venture into the corridor. Much to Foresti's surprise, she sees Kassovitz waiting for her. He asks if her breasts had been nice and she says his hands would have been too big for them. So, he hold up his span and tells Cohen to produce something that would make a nice fit. Kassovitz puts his hand on Foresti's shoulder and their fingers intertwine, as she is wheeled towards the operating theatre.

Reminiscent of latterday woman's pictures like Herbert Ross's Steel Magnolias (1989), this is the kind of French feature that used to be snapped up for a Hollywood remake. It would certainly be intriguing to see how someone like Sarah Silverman, Kristen Wiig or Amy Poehler would handle the Foresti role, while Shirley MacLaine or Jane Fonda would be perfect for the part of the judgemental mother. But, fun though such re-casting games are, the heyday of the Euro reboot has passed and, besides, there are too few frontline American women directors who would be considered a sufficiently safe pair of hands to turn this feel-good weepie into a box-office hit.

In the event of a remake, Anne-Gaëlle Daval's storyline might need tidying up a bit to refine some of the more obviously melodramatic contrivances and to make more of Garcia and the members of her self-help group. But the body image theme is explored with trenchancy and tact, right down to the role that mothers play in their daughter's sense of self. Similarly, while the romantic subplot doesn't quite ignite because Kassovitz's soft-centred womaniser is too much of a cipher, the family dynamic is thoughtfully realised. Admittedly, Bonamy and Cohen's siblings and Astier's daughter could do with fleshing out, but Foresti makes the most of a well-written role, with her self-deprecating wit keeping both glibness and mawkishness at bay. Prioritising plot over insight, Daval directs steadily. But, while Philippe Guibert conveys something of the look and feel of Lyon, the cinematography is rather perfunctory, as are Nicolas Migot's production design and Alexis Rault's score. Yet, this is a well-meaning and frankly affirmational film that says a lot of important things that many men, as well as women, could do with hearing.