Film Review: Populaire

Directed by Régis Roinsard

Starring: Romain Duris, Déborah François, Bérénice Bejo

Let’s all forget our unspoken agreement to lie through our teeth in an effort to appear cultured, and admit that if there’s a choice between a subtitled foreign film and one in our native language, the latter will probably win out. It’s not just laziness; subtitles can be problematic from an artistic point of view. Having to constantly read subtitles distracts you from the visuals of the shot, sometimes revealing critical information before the images have had a chance to catch up, and it is often difficult to connect the tone of voice with that big mush of unfathomable words, meaning subtleties of the dialogue go over your head. Ultimately, through no fault of the filmmakers or audience, this disjointed feel means it can be hard to immerse yourself in the world presented by a subtitled foreign film.

Into these reservations blew the trailer for Populaire, showing a well-dressed boss meeting a ditsy secretary with a talent for typing, and promptly entering her into a typing contest. Will-they-won’t-they romance plot? Check. Misfit leading lady waiting to shine? Quirky scenario? Glamorous 1950s period setting? Big, bright, beautiful dresses? Check, check, check, and check. Oh, and Bérénice Bejo from The Artist is in it too. While many film fans will be groaning into their snobbery and horror collections at the thought (hi Matt, thanks for reading), these ingredients compromise everything I would look for in a fun, easy film, and so I overlooked the groaning sensation let loose by my inner heathen at the mention of the S word, and got ready to read.

As the trailer suggests, the plot revolves around Rose Pomphyle (Déborah François), a modern woman trapped in a small French town, who dreams of leaving it all behind to make it big, starting with a job as a secretary. Enter dashing but gruff Louis Échard (Romain Duris), an insurance man who is fed up with always being second best, both in the eyes of his father and of Marie (Bejo), the woman he once loved who went on to marry his best friend. Échard begins training Rose for the typing championships, but the gruelling schedule and their emerging chemistry complicate their feelings about each other and themselves.

So far, so predictable, but there’s more to this romance than meets the eye, and the characters are not simply allowed to fall into each other’s arms in typical Hollywood style. Despite his generosity, Échard is no Prince Charming, often seeming cold and rude, while Rose is alternately sweet, tough and maddeningly selfish. Both undergo some thorough self-examination as they try to tangle out their places in the world, a theme that reflects the mood of the 1958 setting, which sees France caught between the memory of the war and the new generation’s desire for modernity.

And that 1958 setting looks good. The visuals are awash with the glamour that pervades fifties and sixties period films, with the vast difference between Rose’s sleepy town and the vibrant, modern city emphasised by scenes bedecked in candy colours, fancy cars and snappy dressers. Everyone has their hair styled to perfection, make up looking flawless, puffy dresses, sharp suits and big, shiny houses: in other words, everything you would expect from a retro rom com, but transplanted to France and revolving around a typing competition.

It this plot detail that really lifts this film out of the ordinary and means it would be entirely fair to classify Populaire as a sports movie. It employs a fairly standard formula: an underdog with raw talent and ambition to be great undertakes intense instruction from an expert coach in order to try and win a competition. There are training montages that are surprisingly entertaining, mid-competition disasters, and the tension of whether or not victory will be achieved. The quirky twist, of course, is that the sport involved is speed typing. Populaire does for this what Whip It did for roller derby, in that it brings a frequently derided activity and shows a competitive, gutsy, challenging side that requires discipline and skill. Ultimately, it is this sporting plotline, rather than the romance, which drives the narrative of the film, pushing Populaire from an average rom com to a mix of sports film, love story, drama and comedy.

Like those subtitle sceptics, Populaire is not pretentious in its ambitions, offering light-hearted but moving entertainment rather than hard-hitting drama. While the pervasive screen of retro glamour threatens to posit it firmly in the territory of frothy, mindless love story, the quirky premise, sporting plotline and well-developed main characters takes this from run of the mill and make for a charming, whimsical film.