Populaire - film review

Newcomer Régis Roinsard can’t decide if he's making a romcom set in the Fifties or a pastiche of Fifties romcoms
p39 Populaire 31.5 edition
5 June 2013

It’s hard, while watching this romcom, not to think of sugar. The setting is Normandy in the late Fifties, and the retro clothes and décor suggest îles flottantes, glâces fraises, meringues and Chantilly cream. Whether you can swallow it depends on how you feel about e-numbers. Because newcomer Régis Roinsard’s concoction is seriously artificial.

Rose (Déborah François) is a clutzy gamine who applies for a job as a secretary to the sophisticated Louis (Romain Duris). She only gets it because her fingers go like the clappers when she’s typing; Louis wants to mould her into a “speed typing” champ. She’s adorable and comes to adore him. He’s distracted by an ex-girlfriend (Bérénice Bejo, from The Artist), who married a Yank.

Will Louis realise how wonderful Rose is before it’s too late?

François was perfect as a glacial, ruthless cutie in The Page Turner but she’s not nearly as convincing as a plucky ingénue, possibly because the director makes her indulge in so much face-pulling — it’s as if he can’t decide if this is a romcom set in the Fifties or a pastiche of Fifties romcoms.

It’s in the latter mode that the film works best, with kitschy singing, dancing and swirling montages that demonstrate an affection for a culture at once conservative and daring. When we’re asked to take Rose and Louis’s relationship seriously, however, the spell is broken. The pair are just too shallow to set hearts racing.

At such crucial moments, Populaire (named after the pink and perky machine that Rose winds up endorsing in New York, where she comes up against the typing champion of the world) feels like a cynical attempt to conquer the US market (the Weinsteins are already on board).

Amélie and The Artist served up love stories and became, well, popular. Roinsard tries too hard to pull off the same trick and the taste left in one’s mouth is the opposite of sweet.

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