A Bun in the Oven

Nicole (Karin Viard) actually thinks her life is “in the bag”. At the age of 49, the next step is the menopause, when her doctor's diagnosis comes as a real surprise... Or rather: a shock: Nicole is pregnant! It's been 34 years since her first pregnancy, when she had her son at the age of just 15. As a working mother, Nicole has so far managed the Payans' obligatory family chaos with aplomb. She is both the anchor and the backbone of the family: during the day, Nicole is busy working at a highway toll booth, while in the evenings she manages her husband, who has no plan and is unemployed, an ex-professional gymnast, her somewhat confused mother and their grown-up daughter, who still leads the life of a teenager and sometimes leaves the care of their seven-year-old daughter to her grandparents. Nicole is unsure: one more night of waking up, changing diapers, preparing classwork - and then off to retirement? Nicole has to make a decision. And that's not so easy when every member of the family is pushing the stress levels even higher with clumsy attempts to help. Nadège Loiseau delivers a fast-paced comedy about a new “little lodger” (“Le Petit Locataire”, the original title), featuring committed actors and fast-paced dialog. The personal and professional implications of late motherhood are unraveled in an entertaining way, which conceals completely new pitfalls. Loiseau skillfully balances comedy and more serious themes and has a great leading actress in French César winner Karin Viard. Viard holds the film together like her character Nicole holds this family, who begins to exert immense pressure on the sole breadwinner herself at the moment of greatest pressure. “The doctor has prescribed ‘no trouble’ for the late mother. “How is that supposed to work when I'm already annoyed by the pregnancy itself?” Nicole rages. And the blood pressure monitor, which the doctor also prescribed for her, starts beeping. “The Unexpected Happiness of the Payan Family” is full of such small, precisely observed situations and dialogs. The usual slapstick about misunderstandings and other everyday catastrophes, which director Nadège Loiseaux also stages in her feature film debut, becomes a minor matter. In fact, although the film has the timing of a screwball comedy, in which events are always rushed, it actually takes the topics addressed seriously in a pleasant way. Not only does Nicole consider the possibility of an abortion completely unsentimentally, but the other problems of her “lower class life” are also illuminated. And without any larmoyance.” (Barbara Schweizerhof, in: Berliner Morgenpost)