Let The Sunshine In
She plays a single woman, an artist, who is of a certain age and has trouble finding love. She has four men she dates in this film, plus her ex-husband, whom she still sleeps with, and they all do something or other to tick her off. She is frustrated and bemoans that she can't find true love.
If I were her friend I'd tell her to snap out of it, and maybe focus her attention on something else. This film feeds into the idea that a woman, or a person for that matter, isn't happy or complete without someone else. I think we've evolved beyond that, and a happy person will realize that sometimes one must go though a period of singleness (some periods last a long, long time). At no time does Binoche, or anyone around her, suggest that she focus on her work, or her daughter, or just embrace a chance to get to know herself better. Her character is non-stop neediness. No wonder she can't keep a man.
And the men she ends up! We start with a banker who is married, and point blank tells her he will never leave his wife. He also, during sex, demands that she orgasm. The best moment in the film is when she finally throws him out. Then she has sex with an actor, but he doesn't want to commit. She meets a man in a nightclub, who looks kind of creepy, but another man, a friend who is jealous, points out his flaws, which plants seeds in her mind. Finally, she seems happy with a colleague in the art world, but he tells her doesn't want to go too fast, and is going on vacation with his family and will call her in a month.
I imagine women of about fifty do have a rough go in the dating field, which is why this film seems so wrong-headed and quaint. We see Binoche at work only once, and though art is discussed peripherally, at no time was I convinced that she was actually an artist. Instead it's a ninety-four minute whine about how men are bad. Maybe she should try women, or get a cat.
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