A Difficult Year: A stimulating social comedy (review)
The Toledano-Nakache duo returns with an Italian-style comedy devoted to contemporary collective anxieties and relies on a flamboyant cast.
Eric Toledano and Olivier Nakache hadn’t released a film since Exceptional in 2019 and had fully devoted themselves to the series In therapy. Returning to the cinema with A difficult year, they extend their portrait of the post-confinement world and assume a tone of social satire. The story of two over-indebted men who cross paths with environmental activists fighting against the climate crisis. Between these two accustomed to overconsumption and this movement which advocates degrowth, the contact is not obvious but the presence in the group of a woman named Cactus, a sensitive and committed young woman, will facilitate the interest of the two boasters in environmentalist cause. To illustrate the meeting between contradictory ideologies, the filmmakers use an energetic production which immediately calls upon the voice of Jacques Brel singing There Waltz a thousand times, a way of inviting us to a joyous dance of opposites. As in the great Italian comedies, the characters are moving through their flaws: as a father broken by grief, Jonathan Cohen is amazing; Pio Marmaï impresses with its mix of dynamism and fragility; And Noémie Merlant, as an activist who has cut herself off from her desires, turns out to be very touching. Although the film suffers from a few flaws here and there in its political portrayal as in its sentimental intrigue, the Toledano-Nakache duo ensures the essential: making comedy a stimulating contemporary observation post which calls for awareness. And as such, it truly occupies a special place in French cinema.
A difficult year. Of Éric Toledano and Olivier Nakache With Pio Marmaï, Noémie Merlant, Jonathan Cohen… Duration 1h59. Released October 18, 2023
