Rien à Faire

Vernoux takes a remarkably fresh look at adultery and comes up with a small masterpiece. Bruni Tedeschi, superb as ever, plays an unemployed housewife living on a modern council estate; Dell'Isola is a likewise jobless executive from the same company where she once toiled in the store rooms. First meeting in a supermarket, they find that shopping at the same time alleviates boredom, reduces the social divide between them - and gives rise to something that may be love. Vernoux rightly realises that socio-economic circumstance is what makes the affair possible and inevitably limits its potential; at the same time, she never underestimates the emotional traumas and confusions experienced by the lovers, but, thanks to Dominique Colin's amazing 'Scope close-ups, to some marvellous music, and to an authentic feeling for time and milieu, she makes us empathise with and respect their passion.