The Tasting
Two middle-aged singles meet at a wine tasting in a French romcom that is better when it’s in lighter mode.
Isabelle Carré and Bernard Campan
Image courtesy of Parkland Film Capital.
This is a rare instance of a film made by Ivan Calbérac obtaining a release in the UK – and even this has happened rather belatedly since the film was made in 2022. Nevertheless, in his home country, France, Calbérac is a well-established figure and not only as a filmmaker for cinema and television but as a playwright too. The Tasting (La dégustation) is in fact his film version of a play which he wrote himself and which was staged in 2019 and what is more this is the second time that he has adopted one of his own theatre pieces for the screen (the earlier example being his 2015 film The Student and Mister Henri which just about surfaced in the UK in 2016). I have the impression that his work is usually aimed at audiences seeking popular entertainment and that certainly applies to The Tasting. Consequently, the fact that this release is coming up here in 2025 is in fact very suitable timing. The world news headlines being so grim, I have recently become aware of just how keen cinema audiences are to find films that are essentially upbeat and The Tasting is both very French in character and has been described as a romantic comedy.
Viewed in this light, the opening scenes are very encouraging. It is pleasing, for example, to find that the tale unfolds in the town of Troyes, which has all the atmosphere that you could hope for as well as being a location that is pleasingly fresh. Shot in wide screen and colour by Philippe Guilbert, the film also has the advantage of two leading players, Isabelle Carré and Bernard Campan, whose performances have an engaging naturalism. Carré plays Hortense, a midwife who lives with her mother (Geneviève Mnich) and has reached an age when without a man in her life her desire to have a child makes things challenging. Campan has the role of Jacques Dennemont, a wine dealer in his fifties whose marriage has floundered. The kindly Hortense is involved in setting up weekly meals for the homeless in Troyes and suddenly decides that they deserve a glass of wine to go with it and that brings her into the shop run by Jacques.
Already we can see where the story is going, but Carré and Campan play engagingly and Calbérac’s dialogue favours humorous touches. At the outset health issues lead Jacques to consult his doctor (Olivier Laverie) who warns him about alcohol and he parries by suggesting that wine does not really count under that head. We get an early quote from Baudelaire too (I said that this was a very French piece) while the engaging light music score adopts an old-fashioned style suited to the material and to the actual inclusion of Sidney Bechet’s ‘Petite Fleur’.
There are, of course, subsidiary characters too including a young intern, Steve (Mounir Amamra), taken on to help in the shop who unexpectedly shows a talent at one of the tasting sessions set up by Jacques which might enable him to become an effective sommelier. Also around is Guillaume (Eric Viellard), a bookstore owner and friend of Jacques, who seems ready to make advances to Hortense. Early on, however, Calbérac seems most interested in playing up the wine tasting after which it becomes clear that there is not enough potential development in this for it to remain central. Instead, the story comes to concentrate on finding ways to delay Hortense and Jacques becoming a settled pair even if they have been to bed together (that they share a sex scene is one of the few more contemporary touches in the film).
What Calbérac does to extend the narrative is to give both Hortense and Jacques serious issues that have initially been hidden in addition to which he sketches in a sub-plot which puts the intern under pressure to behave badly despite his growing rapport with Jacques. In the case of Jacques himself the secret guilt that he is nursing is clumsily hinted at long before the details of it emerge. But the fact is that the dramatic issues brought into play turn The Tasting away from being a pleasant light comedy and into a work that comes across as a piece of storytelling which, despite the abilities of the leading players and their refusal to overplay, feels like contrived romantic drama. Calbérac even kills off one of his characters which underlines the change of tone.
Given that The Tasting contains material most likely to appeal to an older audience, it is only fair to point out that many such viewers may readily accept the various plot developments however much they smack of fictional clichés. The disappointment here awaits those who find the film’s early scenes truly engaging in their lightweight style and then to their dismay see the storyline becoming more serious and at the same time less persuasive. Carré and Campan in particular deserved better even if some will buy into The Tasting regardless. But it's also right that I should acknowledge that Ivan Calbérac has given us a film which adroitly hides its stage origin.
Original title: La dégustation.
MANSEL STIMPSON
Cast: Isabelle Carré, Bernard Campan, Mounir Amamra, Eric Viellard, Olivier Claverie, Geneviève Mnich, Rébecca Finet, Sébastien Delpy, Raphaël Thiéry, Jacqueline Galas, Constantin Vidal, Boris Gillot.
Dir Ivan Calbérac, Pro Isabelle Grellat Doublet, Eric Altmayer and Nicolas Altmayer, Screenplay Ivan Calbérac from his stage play, Ph Philippe Guilbert, Pro Des Julia Lemaire, Ed Veronique Parnet, Music Laurent Aknin, Costumes Charlotte David.
Mandarin Films/StudioCanal/France 2 Cinéma/Scope Pictures/ Canal+/Ciné+/France Télévisions-Parkland Film Capital .
92 mins. France. 2022. UK Rel: 31 January 2025. Cert. 15.
