My Donkey, My Lover & I

Antoinette, a schoolteacher, has been waiting months for a holiday with her married lover. At the last moment he cancels and says he is going to the Cévennes with his family. She sets out on the same route alone, on the walking trail, with a stubborn donkey named Patrick. The film is not interested in love. It is interested in being forced to talk to yourself: Antoinette makes all her confessions to the donkey, and those conversations let the film keep her both ridiculous and defensible. The decision at the end belongs to her rather than to a man. The form is a road film: the paths of the Cévennes, campsites, evening tables with strangers. The pace is walking pace and the landscape is never decoration. Caroline Vignal wrote and directed. The film was an unexpected success in France and Laure Calamy won the César for Best Actress for the role. Benjamin Lavernhe plays the lover and Olivia Côte his wife. Patrick the donkey is the second lead, and a great deal of the attention belongs to him. Who it is for: viewers who like French comedy and walking films. Who it is not for: anyone who needs the protagonist to be right throughout. Antoinette is frequently thoughtless and the film does not try to correct her.