The director, Sophie Reine, CIGARETTES, AND HOT CHOCOLATE is the first feature length film, has participated in the editing of the last movie from Rémi Bezançon, Our Future. The two filmmakers have in common the same universe : sensitive, poetic, quirky, without pathos, funny, tender, moving.
The story’s quasi-autobiographical Sophie Queen evokes subtly in a very complicated situation for a young boy, Denis (excellent and just as Gustave Kervern), who became a man and a father, the air of nothing. Faced with the grief of his companion, he’s doing as well as they could, without having neither the codes, nor the money, nor the time to manage the day to day. But in the eyes of the law, it is a parent that is failing, and must follow a course on parental responsibility. The about ready to smile as it is true that some parents would need to know the béa-ba before launch… but we learn eventually to be a parent ? And what is a good parent ? How to be certain that it was the spirit of family ? Love is it enough ? How to combine theory and practice ? What to do when one is faced with the illness of one of her children ? These are all questions that the film attempts to answer, through the encounter with the other mode of education proposed by Séverine (Camille Cottin, very fair also).
This confrontation obviously gives rise to funny situations and heartwarming. Of course, the plug is pushed a little far, but serves as the subject subtly. The two daughters of Denis are great (Héloïse Dugas and Fanie Zanini), and on the whole, CIGARETTES AND HOT CHOCOLATE is a real feel good movie !
Sylvie-Noelle