Happily Ever After (2004) - Synopsis
Yvan Attal’s feature directorial debut, Ma femme est une actrice, took a wry, direct look at how a man coped with the success of his wife, a well-known actress. It was predominantly breezy and light, but occasionally took on a darker hue. Ils se marièrent et eurent beaucoup d’enfants, Attal’s new film, also concentrates on marriage, but this time the scope is broader, the canvas wider. In both films, however, Attal displays a knack for depicting the quotidian outline and content of the lives of couples, while keeping the story moving along.
Here, he depicts three buddies, two married, one single, and their various relationships. Vincent (Attal) and Georges (Alain Chabat) are the married ones, each with a five-year-old child. Both men are beginning to chafe at the “bonds” they imagine to be constraining their lives. It doesn’t make things any easier that the other member of the triumvirate, Fred (Alain Cohen), is a bachelor with an endless row of women lined up to share his bed. Ironically, while envied by his pals, Fred ultimately desires what they have: a committed relationship with one partner.
It is subsequently revealed that Vincent is seeing another woman and keeping the affair a secret from his friends and from his wife, Gabrielle (Charlotte Gainsbourg). But Gabrielle, unbeknownst to Vincent, is already aware of her husband’s affair and is just hoping that things will all work out – until, that is, she encounters an attractive stranger in the aisles of a music store.
Life can be complicated and Attal is not one to judge, preferring instead to observe in detail the antics, rational and irrational, of his characters. He elicits natural and winning performances from his cast, again placing himself and Gainsbourg, his wife, into a fictional marriage as the film’s central couple. This film will resonate with anyone who wants a taste of what others always seem to have: that illusive thing called happiness. As with its predecessor, the light surface of this work conceals deeper truths.
