La Californie

I saw this at the 2007 Palm Springs International Film Festival. It's a small film but has a great cast. This is set in Cannes and based on a short story and the film seems a little stretched out to the point of being thin. Prollific author and Cannes resident George Simeon wrote the short and his daughter-in-law actress Mylène Demongeot who was married to Simeon's son, director Marc Simeon, is cast in the film in the role of Katia. Nathalie Baye is Maguy and delivers a terrific performance as an aging wealthy socialite whose money and looks are running out. She owns a yacht but hates being on the water so it's docked near her home and serves as the home of her Croatian lover Mirko (Roschdy Zem) and his childhood pal Stephan (Radivoje Bukvic). Rounding out this menagerie of humanity are two gay lovers who are hanger-ons in Maguy's house that she also shares with her longtime friend Katia. Maguy has a daughter Helène who has fallen in love with Stephan and plan to marry and start a book publishing business in Paris. It's a good story but things unravel just too rapidly in this story to be believable. There are nice touches of humor to offset the brooding drama. It's worth a look and I would give it a 7.0 out of 10.

Mr Fieschi was a good screenwriter for famous French directors, such as Claude Sautet. When he decided to go behind the movie camera, he picked up a not well known short story by Georges Simenon and some well known good actors, such as Mylene Demongeot, Ludivine Sagnier and mainly Nathalie Baye,who gives here one of her best performances. Located in the beautiful capital of the French Festivals (Cannes), with two Croatian actors who are quite good, the story is going rather smoothly for the first hour, until the whole story goes apart, because too many changes have been brought to the subject in order to give it a touch of modernism. And the tragic but incomprehensible ending made me awfully regret the money spent to see this movie, palatable only to the fans of Ms. Baye But who am I to give such a drastic comment? Just one of those who adores American movies and contributes via the heavy taxation to provide fresh money for amateur movie makers.. Harry Carasso, Paris, France