By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.5 cats
Director: François Dupeyron
Starring: Claude Rich | Elisabeth Oppong | Félicité Wouassi | Jacky Ido | Mamadou Dioumé | Mata Gabin | Ralph Amoussou
Original language title: Aide-toi, le ciel t'aidera
Country: france
Year: 2009
Running time: 94
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1087829/
Bruce says: “Sonia (Félicité Wouassi) is having many difficulties – with her gambling husband George (Mamadou Dioumé), her pregnant daughter Suze (Elisabeth Oppong), her seemingly suicidal pre-adolescent son Leo (Charles-Étienne N’Diaye) and her son Victor (Ralph Amoussou) who is running with the wrong crowd and has chalked up three arrests the month he turns eighteen. Sonia works in her housing development as a nurse’s aide taking care of local geriatrics. Robert, the old man who lives across the hall, not-so-secretly lusts after Sonia. ‘Too bad you’re black, you could have been my daughter,’ Robert tells Sonia affectionately. When George and Victor get into a violent fight, Georges suddenly drops dead. Sonia continues on her way to her older daughter’s wedding and never mentions George. She does confide in Robert who offers to temporarily house the corpse and helps Sonia bury Georges in the basement so Sonia can still collect his pension checks. Everyone thinks George has gone back to his other wives in Africa. Robert’s interest in Sonia becomes less paternal and he begins to make demands.
“Sonia gets a little advice from her good friend Marijo (Mata Gabin), ‘You need sex. Look at me. I talk to the angels.’ Marijo, although married, is always having flings with various men. She boasts about her conquests in ways more masculine than feminine. Sonia is intrigued and notices that Marijo’s current fling Fer (Jacky Ido) is casting his eye in her direction. Is it possible that to satisfy her own needs she needs to steal her best friend’s paramour?
“WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MYSELF has a lightness similar to that of Charles Burnett’s MY BROTHER’S WEDDING. While the issues of many of the banlieues (French suburbs) are all serious ones, François Dupeyron treats the immigrant experience with levity. The extraordinarily strong performance of Félicité Wouassi anchors the film. She is ebullient, sensitive, subtly sexy and incurably optimistic. 4.5 cats
“(WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MYSELF screened as part of the Rendezvous with French Cinema festival sponsored by the Film Society of Lincoln Center.)”