To be honest, the first and main reason that made me want to watch this movie is Parker Posey. The gorgeous, irresistably charming actress whose forte is appearing in indie, conversational pieces and winning praises from even the staunchest film critics. Occasionally, she pops up in mainstream fare and when she does, the roles are highly memorable. She obviously had heaps of fun portraying an evil, campy vampire in Blade:Trinity and a sexy, fiesty fashion designer seeking a divorce in Laws Of Attraction.Known more for her comedic and madcap performances, Parker turns in a more calibrated and contemplative performance in Broken English. As a single, thirty something woman working as a guest relations executive in a boutique hotel, Nora Wilder seems to have it all, on the surface. She is beautiful, intelligent and always dressed to kill. Her job allows her to meet the rich and the famous and becomes a topic of enthusiastic discussion amongst her mother's friends. She attends the hippiest parties and her bestest friend provides yoga company, shopping advice and emotional support. Not to mention, she has a cozy, sleek apartment to herself.
This sounds like a single woman's dream. Just that well, Nora is single, lonely and desperate for love. Ironically, she is cynical about finding it and has her heart well-fenced up. She tries her luck at love, meets handsome promising men but they are all wrong for her. After a couple of disasterous dates, she sinks into a deep funk. In a rather poignant scene, Nora breaks down in a restaurant after confessing to her mother about how lonely she is. Although her mother (Gena Rowlands) oftens reminds Nora how she "gave away" a good man to her best friend by introducing them, she shows support by telling Nora to "to go everywhere even if you don't feel like it." Nora's best friend Audrey (a wonderful chirpy Drea de Matteo) is also a reliable buddy cum cheerleader who keeps her company when she is down.
In her depressed state, Nora decides not to celebrate the Fourth of July but after drinking wine by herself and staring at the four corners of her quiet apartment, she makes an eleventh hour attempt to quell her restlessness and emptiness by going to her colleague's party. There, she feels even more out of place until she meets a dashing, charismatic Frenchman Julien (Melvil Poupaud) with a fedora hat and plenty of patience and persuasion. Julien's genuine interest in Nora and his ignorance of her pent-up frustrations, is the perfect antidote to Nora's jadedness and skepticism. They spend a beautiful weekend together but his steadfastness causes her to have an anxiety attack in public as she grapples with the relationship that is unfolding. When Nora realizes that his feelings might be true, Julien has to return to his country and she is faced with a dilemma. To stay in her safe but stagnant environment or to go with him to France, and give herself and love a chance?
Although the synopsis of the story seems to be about finding love, I think it is essentially about a typical educated, independant woman living in a fast-paced, modern society, dealing with her neuroses. The director's own compassion for women, together with the magnificent acting from Posey, manages to capture the excruciating struggles of loneliness and overwhelming insecurities of modern women. I love how the slow-moving pace and the unfanciful everyday dialogue contributed to the realism of the film and the melancholy which stayed long after the film has ended, made me think...
Its wierd that I'm not even at that stage of my life and I can totally identify with Nora. Its not about finding love. Its about feeling lost, empty and lonely. I think its about finding ourselves.
