Other People’s Children
Rebecca Zlotowski tells an unusual French love story but misjudges the tone.
Virginie Efira and Callie Ferreira-Goncalves
Other People’s Children is a film at odds with itself despite the fact that Rebecca Zlotowski both wrote and directed it. The only work of hers previously known to me was 2013’s Grand Central which I had found disappointing, but ahead of watching her latest feature I read some reviews of it and they had led me to think that this time I would have a much more positive response.
The indication was that this would be a subtle and detailed study of an unusually original kind. It is the tale of a teacher, Rachel Friedmann (Virginie Efira), who has reached the age of forty without having had a child. We meet her when a relationship with Paul (Sébastien Pouderoux) has already ended and she is taking up with a new lover, Ali (Roschdy Zem). He does have a child, four-year-old Leïla (Calle Ferreira-Goncalves), from his former marriage to Alice (Chiara Mastroianni) and Rachel's new relationship leads to her seeing much of Leïla. In point of fact Rachel had never been concerned about not becoming a mother but her increasing rapport with Ali’s daughter has a significant impact on her. A gynaecologist (this being an unexpected cameo role for the director Frederick Wiseman) has advised her that time is short if she is ever to become pregnant and it is almost as though she is finding in Leïla a surrogate daughter. Indeed, the connection between them starts to feel more secure than her relationship with Ali.
From what I read I had gathered too that there would be a number of subsidiary characters on the periphery. Viewing the film confirmed this and revealed them to be such figures as Rachel’s sister Louana (Yamée Couture), a sympathetic teacher named Vincent who is himself drawn to Rachel (Henri-Noël Tabary), the mother of one of the school pupils (Anne Berest) and a student named Dylan (Victor Lefebvre) who, uncertain of his future, is going through a difficult patch. That all of these are to a greater or lesser extent incidental figures fits well with the film’s general approach which is to present a storyline rooted in persuasively detailed everyday reality as opposed to being plot driven. Two aspects found here are very much in keeping with this, the first is that the film proves to be quintessentially French in tone and the second is that it is very expressive of a female sensibility. However, it seemed bizarre that more than one review that I had read described Other People’s Children as a romcom. Could they possibly have seen the same film? Sadly, the answer is yes.
The fact that Rebecca Zlotowski does indeed choose to tell her story within the trappings of a romcom means that the film is at war with itself. The players involved right down to the very natural child actress Callie Ferreira-Goncalves are all accomplished enough to make this function as a quiet, naturalistic work, one which, eschewing contrived melodrama (it is characteristic of the piece that when Rachel and Alice meet they find themselves liking each other), shows us realistic people in a realistic situation. That being so, it seems positively perverse to set up a conflicting tone by inserting elements of a romcom kind. This comes up most clearly on the soundtrack which, having initially set a light tone even if Vivaldi is called upon, proceeds to offer a series of songs superimposed at intervals and sometimes heard over more than one scene (perhaps the oddest choice here is to include an ancient Doris Day recording of the song ‘Again’ which is incorporated twice). But, if music plays a key role in undermining the sense of reality, some of the dialogue also has a touch of romcom about it and there is even one scene which comically finds Rachel nude on a balcony when trying to conceal her presence in Ali’s apartment. Here romcom combines with farce and makes it less surprising that the film also manages to fit in views of the Eiffel Tower lit up. Other visual touches include one example of superimposed images which feels quite out of character and a frequent use of the iris shot, an odd but not displeasing mannerism.
The best part of Other People’s Children is to be found in its epilogue. Set sometime later, it is a beautifully judged sequence. Both unexpected yet meaningful, it is played straight with no romcom additions and no music except at the very close when we hear Georges Moustaki’s song ‘Les Eaux de Mars’. Here for the first time a song works perfectly, being an expressive summation of life as something that not only continues but contains a definite hope that misfortunes can be overcome. This is so effective that one feels all the more infuriated that the rest of the film is so misjudged.
Original title: Les enfants des autres.
MANSEL STIMPSON
Cast: Virginie Efira, Roschdy Zem, Callie Ferreira-Goncalves, Chiara Mastroianni, Roman Kolinka, Yamée Couture, Anne Berest, Henri-Noël Tabary, Victor Lefebvre, Sébastien Pouderoux, Mireille Perrier, Michel Zlotowski, Antonia Buresi, Marlene Saldana, Frederick Wiseman.
Dir Rebecca Zlotowski, Pro Frédéric Jouve, Screenplay Rebecca Zlotowski, Ph George Lechaptois, Pro Des Katia Wyszkop, Ed Géraldine Mangenot, Music Rob, Costumes Bénédicte Mouret-Cherqui.
Les Films Velvet/France 3 Cinéma/Canal+/Ciné+-Signature Entertainment.
104 mins. France. 2022. US Rel: 21 April 2023. UK Rel: 17 March 2023. Cert. 15.
