by MATTHEW HAYS

The spirit of Woody Allen can be felt throughout Ma femme est une actrice, the latest feature from actor-director Yvan Attal. He plays a neurotic sports writer, married to a beautiful and charming popular French film star, Charlotte (played by the filmmaker’s real-life wife, Charlotte Gainsbourg, who’s a beautiful and charming popular French film star).

There’s a lot of Woody in this movie, from Attal’s burgeoning obsession with his wife’s career to hints of infidelity to farcical set-ups. Like the famous Jewish New Yorker, Attal has denied the film has much bearing in reality. Instead, it’s a crazy set-up, in which the onscreen Attal can’t reconcile himself to Charlotte’s faux lovemaking. In particular, he becomes quite enraged when he meets her latest leading man (a role perfectly filled by Terence Stamp), knowing full well that the two will be performing an explicit sex scene together.

Attal has a ripe imagination, and creates some funny scenarios. When Charlotte tells the director she’s extremely uncomfortable doing a nude scene, he suggests that the entire cast and crew go naked in solidarity with her—at the very moment Attal decides to make a surprise visit to the set.

But for all its funny bits, Ma femme suffers as Attal’s obsession grows. Basically, we’re held captive to his increasing discomfort with Charlotte’s profession. The life of an actor is innately nutty, as the film suggests, and that’s something both leads have clearly had time to ponder. But all this neurosis begins to grate, and that dredges up a crucial difference between Attal and Woody.

While being hopelessly neurotic, Woody can also make us laugh. That’s very necessary, because the act of simply listening to someone go on and on about how messed up they are can be terrifically gruelling—unless, of course, someone’s got humour on their side. While a talented actor, Attal’s script simply doesn’t offer up enough laughs to make it all go down a bit easier. Thus we’re left with an only-occasionally funny, often-abrasive film.

This is not a good thing. :

Ma femme est une actrice opens Friday, Oct. 4

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