COMEDY; 1hr 36min
STARRING: Julie Delpy, Adam Goldberg
Tête à tête: Delpy and Goldberg
Channelling elements of Woody Allen, actress Julie Delpy takes her first turn as a film-maker with the tart observation of an at-odds vacationing couple. Interior designer Jack (Goldberg) is a neurotic American, photographer Marion (Delpy) a pragmatic Française. After a disappointing visit to Venice, where Jack’s digestion took exception to the cuisine, the pair stop in Paris en route home to New York. There, Jack has the dubious pleasure of Marion’s parents (played with gusto by Delpy’s actual folks). Since they don’t speak each other’s language, Jack is largely isolated, a pattern that continues through a roll call of taxing encounters.
It falls to Goldberg to register a scale of morose dismay — which he’s more than capable of doing — as the French unleash risqué business, for which they have a distinctive knack. Meanwhile, Delpy runs a gamut of high-maintenance emotions with the same Euro-poise that defines her direction. Relationships can be hairy but it’s even hairier to manoeuvre your way through a crisis of emotional complications — and still keep your audience smiling.
