Sunday, March 7, 2010

Joueuse (France - 2009)

Yesterday, on my plane ride home, I found this amazing French movie. "Joueuse" which was translated as "Queen to Play". When it was over, I watched it again! But couldn't finish watching it the second round.

Change can happen and will happen, in many different ways. Chess is only one means.

It was about a middle aged lady, Hélène, living a simple and quite routine and boring life in a very beautiful village in France. She works as a maid in a hotel and at Dr Kroger's, has a nice husband it seems, and a teenage daughter. It seems all is calm in her life and in her relationships; every one takes her and her actions as granted: a timely maid, trustworthy with her job, available to her family, attentive to her guests, ... Suddenly she finds a newly discovered passion in herself: to play chess. She decides to not only learn the game but become good at it, and Dr Kroger gets to coach her. I liked him very much, played by Kevin Kline. His wife was passed away as an undiscovered artist, "her doubt was stronger than her painting". Another quote from him that I liked "having a lousy plan is better than having no plan at all".
She discovers herself in a new way and let her family and friends and enemies also find that aspired and free lady in her. All the granted behaviors change after that. Oh and she dances a very authentic dance with her daughter in the middle of the movie, when she encountered her doubts. I loved that!
"La dame est la pièce la plus forte... c'est fou hein?" : "The queen is the strongest piece ... it's crazy, eh?"

2 comments:

  1. Nice! I think I would like it so much...

    Salma

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yeah I am sure you would Sali joon! I wish we could watch it together!...

    ReplyDelete

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An emigrant from an ancient civilization to North America, an engineer in marketing and management, a mom of working kind, who thinks when she talks, and who likes to write. I, L.B., own the copyright to the content.