Joséphine (2013) Reviews

• Okay, but not quite good enough

  orinocowomble2015-10-04

  Bridget Jones meets Meg Ryan in this fluffy, improbable romcom. The title character has serious body-image issues (unfounded of course) and serious sibling rivalry issues. Her sister's announcement of her engagement drives Jojo to claim a similar attachment, though at rising 30 she is living alone in her grandma's Paris apartment with her cat. Jojo's engagement is entirely imaginary, leading her into a maelstrom of deception and silliness worthy of Meg Ryan's worst. The film is enormously derivative, and any fan of fluff will recognise the sources: the many, many "gotta have a boyfriend to show off at the party" films, the news story a few years back of the Japanese woman living in someone's apartment without the owner's knowledge; even the background music is strongly reminiscent of same in "You've Got Mail" (I was not the only person who noticed this when we watched it.) The individual actors do what they can, and their performances are good, but the script was weak and the end patched on. While watching this, we were all tempted more than once to just stop the film. I've seen many romcoms that manage to wrap up the silliness in a satisfying way, but this is not one of them. IMDb's board says that people who liked this film also liked "Vilaine" (which receives more than one nod in Josephine). Vilaine is a much better film.

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