‘Anais in Love’ an enchanting French romance with touches of whimsy
Anais (Anais Demoustier), the beautiful little dynamo at the heart of the often whimsical romance “Anais in Love,” reminded me of the paradox of the irresistible force that meets an unmovable object. She is a bit of a mess at the beginning of the film from writerdirector Charline BourgeoisTacquet, making an impressive feature debut. Anais, who is a claustrophobe, can frequently be seen running in Paris because so much is happening in her life.
She has missed two months of rent payment on her tiny flat with its faulty gas stove. She has missed a deadline on the second part of her thesis. She is pregnant, although not for much longer. Her mother’s cancer has returned after years in remission. Her father (Bruno Todeschini) objects when an upset Anais enters his and his wife’s bedroom and wakes him. She is supposed to be attending a symposium and handling all the hotel bookings and meetings for her tutor (Gregoire Oestermann). Her brother Balthazar is babysitting a lemur, which Anais cannot bear to touch.
In the meantime, she meets a publisher old enough to be her father at a dinner. His name is Daniel Moreau-Babin (Denis Podalydes).
He signs his emails DMB and succumbs to Anais’ quirky, but potent charms, despite the fact that he is married to the writer Emilie Decret (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi). To defend his infidelity, Daniel says he does not know what his wife “gets up to” at her literary events and her country home. Anais becomes obsessed with Emilie before meeting her and follows her to a different symposium at the picturesque Chateau de Kerduel in Brittany, leaving her tutor high and dry.
Anais is an iconic figure in French cinema. We have met her many times over the decades being played by different actors. But Anais herself is almost always the same. A young person hungry for sexual experience and eager to seize the day, or “carpe diem” as the poets put it in Latin.
Bourgeois-Tacquet was awarded prizes for her 2018 short film “Pauline Enslaved.” Her Anais makes the most of a small collection of dresses, one a red variation of the little black dress, and perhaps a metaphor for the fire in Anais’ veins. “Anais in Love” is another portrait of a woman on fire. Anais goes after Emilie like a demon, showering her with attention and praise and showing up at her talks, enchanted by every words dropping from Emilie’s lips.
Are Daniel and Emilie stand-ins for Anais’ parents? Is her ardent desire for Emilie a manifestation of her deep concern for her mother? The French might say peut-etre (perhaps). To the tune of Purcell’s “Dido and Aeneas,” a flurry of love let
ters is exchanged between Anais and Emilie after the symposium.
Bourgeois-Tacquet worked in publishing after studying literature and acting. She bears a physical resemblance to Demoustier, who presumably plays a version of the writer-director.
This is perhaps another reason that Anais leaps from the screen and that Demoustier is so marvelous playing her.
Fall in love with “Anais in Love.”