The Names of Love (Le nom de gens)

First Hit: I enjoyed this tongue-in-cheek film about a woman who wants to change fascists to liberals through sex.

However, don’t think you’re going to watch a lot of sex in this film.

This film is about family, the different aspects and quirks of families, and love. Baya (played by Sara Forestier) is brought up by a leftist French mother who married a Muslim man from Africa. Because her mother was always out leading some social charge and with the stigma of her father’s way of life, through her sexiness and wild abandoned ideas she thinks she can change fascists (and she thinks just about everyone is a fascist) into more liberal thinkers, like herself.

One day she meets Arthur (played by Jacques Gamblin) who is Jewish but doesn’t own up to it because his grandparents were killed by the Germans in WWII. The family took a name change and therefore is immediately seen as non-Jewish. They find within each other a tolerance for their beliefs and a deep caring about the other.

How this film intertwines family, beliefs, relationships, the past, and the future is where the magic lies. It intercuts between all of these items, except the future while hinting at it ever so slightly. The joy and sadness of each principal, how they misunderstand the other and more importantly how they find the depth of their relationship is the real story, not that Baya sleeps with fascists to convert them.

Forestier is amazingly open forthcoming and believable in her part as Baya. She draws you in with her infectiousness and brazen style. Gamblin, is perfect as the man who wants to let loose a little more but also wants to keep control over his life. Baya draws him out. Michel Leclerc and Baya Kasmi wrote a stellar funny and yet poignant script. Leclerc directed this with a clear thought of what he wanted to see in the end.

Overall: This was a very enjoyable film and its characters were well defined and well acted.

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