Movie review | The pleasant everyday drama Madeleine's Paris avoids the pitfalls of the genre

Drama

Madeleine's Paris (La Belle course), directed by Christian Carion 91 min. K12. ★★★

in France aging stars are not pushed aside, but get their share of the limelight very late. 95 years old, one of France's greatest singer icons Line Renaud present of Christian Carion Madeleine's Paris –in the film, 92-year-old Madeleine Keller orders a taxi ride to a nursing home for the elderly.

The doctor has ordered Madeleine to a nursing home, because after the fall she can no longer cope at home alone. However, the cheerful old man is not in a hurry to his new place of residence, so he starts chatting with the taxi driver Charles (Dany Boon) with on his way to the other side of the city.

Charles has money problems and is not in the mood to talk, but Madeleine's company makes the curmudgeon open his mouth. An old woman and a middle-aged driver start to feel bad.

Cute? Well, not exactly, because the French tend to give such films a bit of edge, which cuts off the worst sentimentality. Now it's about Madeleine's life as a young person. It hasn't been easy. The attitudes towards women of the 1950s have hit young Madeleine hard.

In the flashbacks, the younger Madeleine is played Alice Isaaz.

During the taxi ride, Madeleine wants to visit places she is familiar with in Paris. It's not really a nostalgia trip, it's more of a last look before life closes inside the walls of the nursing home.

Or as Madeleine and Charles say together: la Belle course, good trip.

Renaud and Boon are excellent in their roles, and the views of Paris are offered as much as is necessary. The result is a pleasant everyday drama, which only at the very end starts to turn to the over-emotional side.

On the soundtrack Etta James and Dinah Washington singing their 1950s classics At Last and This Bitter Earth, which is a clear nod to Renaud's singing career. After all, he has performed such songs himself.

Written by Cyril Gély and Christian Carion, starring Line Renaud, Dany Boon, Alice Isaaz.