WHEN AUTUMN FALLS
- Kathleen Bondar
- Mar 22
- 2 min read
DIRECTOR: FRANÇOIS OZON
CAST: HÉLÈNE VINCENT, LUDIVINE SAGNIER, JOSIANE BALASKO AND PIERRE LOTTIN
FRENCH; ENGLISH SUBTITLES; RT 102 MINS
IN UK & IRISH CINEMAS 21ST MARCH 2025
REVIEW by KATHLEEN BONDAR
Not a lot seems to happen in Francois Ozon’s latest film When Autumn Falls despite a cataclysmic event and some significant revelations. So, forgive the plot spoilers but rest assured When Autumn Falls is not a mystery thriller. However, whilst Ozon's film parks some monumental themes as if they are commonplace, it turns out to be a masterclass in the unsaid and the understated.
At first, the film focusses on the uneventful, day-to-day life of peaceable grandmother Michelle (Hélène Vincent) who potters around her kitchen sharing coffee with her best friend Marie-Claude (Josiane Balasko). The retired women bemoan their troublesome grown children. Marie-Claude awaits the release of her thuggish son (Josiane Balasko) from prison and Michelle worries her resentful daughter Valerie (Ludivine Sagnier) will deny her visits from her beloved grandson Lucas.
Marie-Claude is a wise, weighty, glass half-full, throaty chain smoker whilst the placid Michelle tries to keep optimistic. She busies and bakes and frets about her truculent daughter wishing Valerie had not turned against her.
The season mirrors the older women. The trees are shedding leaves, the ground is frosty and covered in rusty ferns. The women forage for mushrooms and prepare for winter ahead. The metaphor is simple. They are aging.
They have led their lives in their own fashion. Poignantly, the revelation that the best friends were “on the game” is sidelined as just one of those jobs that had to be done to make ends meet and not worth dwelling upon.
Indeed, the seemingly ordinary troubles of these likeable, working-class women and the bucolic setting bely startling revelations. The tragic incident involving Michelle’s daughter and Marie-Claude’s son happens off-screen and becomes something unmentioned in that way that families do.
It is the relationships in When Autumn Falls which mark the film. The friendship between the women is solid. Their complex relationships with their children, and Michelle’s love for her grandson are skilfully unravelled. And, of course, it’s always refreshing to find two older women taking centre stage in a thought-provoking film.