THE AGE OF REASON

Pepe's View:

Sophie Marceau as Margaret, portrays a high powered executive who is turning 40 and totally focussed on her professional life and lover. When a notary from her childhood village turns up at the office with a bundle of letters, she is perplexed and annoyed at this interruption to her schedule. The letters turn out to be written by Margaret herself at the age of 7 (the age of reason) and given to the notary with instructions to deliver them to her 40 year old self.

The letters confront Margaret with her provincial childhood which she had tried to hide from her present role, even assuming a completely different history and name and they reveal all her hopes, dreams and aspirations for the future.

Directed by Yann Samuell, this film had so much promise and is directed with great skill - the scenes of the past are interwoven beautifully - but unfortunately it seemed to slide into romantic idealism.  The scenes where she relives her love of her childhood and in particular her love for her childhood sweetheart, while lovely, dwell far too much on the romantic.  The letters keep coming and eventually she contacts her childhood sweetheart and invites him to meet her in a tourist cave to see if their love could be reignited.

It seemed to me that the premise is that we all have childhood dreams of what life will be like, and what we will achieve with our lives but the reality is very different for most of us.  This idea was worth exploring but unfortunately the movie seemed to be afraid to confront this real issue.  The ending of the movie was particularly disappointing in that, after Margaret had rejected her boss and her lover for all they stand for professionally, she is then miraculously reunited with her lover and they, it would seem, live happily ever after, Margaret using her skills to help underprivileged children while her lover continued his high powered career.

A movie that promised so much but delivered so little due to a confusion of themes.

My Score:  7/10

Ma's view:

I would have to agree.  Sophie Marceau is gorgeous but a little one-dimensional and her English lover a little bit the same.  The concept certainly had potential - how can we be true to our best selves in this cut-throat commercial world?  Unfortunately, the letters from the 7 yo Sophie were somewhat unrealistic both in content and presentation i.e. it was hard to accept they could be written by a 7yo.  On the positive side, they did evoke some lovely scenes from a childhood when all dreams seemed possible of fulfulment and it was heartwarming both for her and the viewers to discover that her childhood friend had stood firm in his values and pursued his dreams.  The ending tried to have a bet both ways and would have been more satisfying and more French had she walked away from her current relationship as she did from her job to become the person her 7yo self had imagined she could become.

My score:  7/10