Alice Lantins (Virginie Efira), the editor of the glossy magazine “Rebelle,” is working her fingers to the bone. She hopes her superiors will reward her diligence with a promotion. However, Alice’s boss believes that the 38-year-old Parisian is too prim and dull to lead a publication whose name translates to “rebel.” Therefore, he favors a liberated young Canadian woman for the position of editor-in-chief. When Alice realizes she’s losing the career race, she starts a romance with 18-year-old student Balthazar (Pierre Niney) to show her boss that she, too, knows how to have fun and do crazy things. But while Alice sees the guy as just a bargaining chip in negotiations with her superiors, Balthazar falls head over heels in love, putting the woman in an awkward position.
Behind the Scenes and Social Commentary
The film’s sets were created by French production designer Jean Rabasse, known in Russia for “The City of Lost Children” and “Vidocq.”
French director David Moreau is known at home and around the world as the director of the horror films “The Eye” and “Them.” “It Boy” is a romantic comedy. However, as one French critic wryly noted, it is, in essence, Moreau’s scariest film. After all, it reminds viewers that in the age of Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, the authorities judge people not only by how they work but also by the waves they make on social networks. “Big Brother” is not the police and special services, but friends, relatives, and casual acquaintances who can turn you into a laughingstock with the touch of a button. Or, conversely, help with a promotion if your business needs to “burn,” not sulk. What could be scarier than a world where everyone is watching everyone and everyone is informing on everyone? Even Orwell didn’t go that far.
In 2014, we saw Pierre Niney in the title role of the French biopic about the famous fashion designer “Yves Saint Laurent.”
A Lighthearted Take on Modern Relationships
However, as is clear from the director’s interview and from the film itself, Moreau was not going to scare anyone. He depicted the mores of modern Europe without any ulterior motive to entertain viewers with a simple-minded romantic comedy about a budding “cougar” (as older women who “hunt” for young guys are called in the West) and her naive victim. The film is shot according to Hollywood patterns, and Virginie Efira looks like several American stars at once (primarily Katherine Heigl). Nevertheless, it is still a French comedy with sometimes highbrow jokes and an atmosphere of uninhibited farce. No plot innovations, no particularly witty jokes, but the film is easy and pleasant to watch. Of course, if you have no fundamental objections to the relationship between a student and a woman in her late thirties. Who, by the way, has a teenage daughter and an ex-husband with a young mistress.
Strengths and Weaknesses
One of the obvious shortcomings of the picture is the slightly chaotic script, overloaded with minor characters. One of the obvious advantages is only the lead actor. Rising star of French theater and cinema Pierre Niney (two nominations for “Cesar” in the category “most promising actor”) plays a lovestruck boy so charmingly and sincerely that he “removes” all partners. If many of the characters in the picture seem like flat caricatures of glamorous Parisians, then Balthazar appears as a real person - awkward and insecure, but also sincere, romantic, and devoted. An excellent protagonist for a picture that, like most rom-coms, is primarily aimed at women.