Living on Love Alone (***1/2)

Julie (Anaïs Demoustier), age 23 and just beginning her first grown-up at a Paris PR agency, is the subject of this drama. Although her looks attract men to her, in most ways she’s kind of an ordinary young woman, which I liked about the story. Probably had the job, or the people there, been a little different, it might have gone better. Perhaps in another life she’d have become the mistress of the 41-year-old guy she picks up in a club. Instead, there is another job and another man, one who provides an alluring and possibly dangerous alternative to the dull existence she sees before her.

The English title seems unsatisfactory, more suggestive of a romantic film, although the original French title, which translates as Of Love and Fresh Water, isn’t that helpful either. But what it suggests after seeing the film relates to the weight of reality and that adulthood is a series of choices, compromises, and consequences.

IMDB link

viewed 4/10/11 at Ritz East [Cinefest 2011 screening] and reviewed 4/10/11 and 4/17/11

The Promotion (***)

What’s so funny about supermarkets? I don’t know, but this is at least the third movie in 20 months that has seen them as a font of comic possibilities. (There was also 2004’s Win a Date with Tad Hamilton!) Employee of the Month was a silly Dane Cook comedy that, just like here, was centered around the competition between two clerks. The British Cashback took a more sophisticated, even existential, approach and mostly succeeded. This movie starring Seann William Scott and John C. Reilly as rivals for a store manager position sort of splits the difference.

Writer-director Steve Conrad, who wrote The Weatherman and The Pursuit of Happyness, veers back and forth between fairly broad humor and straight drama. But that’s also what’s interesting about the movie. Scott’s character is the primary one, but I was unsure if Reilly is supposed to be a villain or not. It turns out that no one is the villain, but no one is heroic either. Who gets the manager job is settled in a way that’s surprising only because it makes perfect sense, the story having set the stage for something wackier. Jenna Fischer and Lily Taylor play the wiser wives of these imperfect men. (Fischer, incidentally, appeared in a 2004 movie called Employee of the Month that’s completely unrelated to the Dane Cook one.)

Conrad has a feel for the way male self-worth and identity is frequently related to professional success. The Weatherman and The Pursuit of Happyness were star vehicles for Nicholas Cage and Will Smith, but also touched on this theme. This is a smaller movie, but it’s just as well-acted and nearly as appealing, though the comedy is hit or miss.

IMDB link

viewed 4/24/08 (screening at Ritz 5); reviewed 6/17-18/08