Le Week-End

Although there are a number of visual references to the films of the French New Wave in Roger Michell's rambunctious romance Le Week-End, they are only local color in this fetching but unmemorable piece of vacation porn. Jim Broadbent and Lindsay Duncan play an aging couple who have hit a dead end and attempt to use a 30th anniversary Paris weekend to rekindle their spark. The trip quickly becomes an occasion to open old wounds and assess their troubled marriage, and irresponsible impulses take over, with much of the film dedicated to the vicarious thrill of raiding hotel minibars and skipping out on dinner checks. Broadbent specializes in this sort of loosened-tie fussbudget, and Duncan is a revelation as the more dissatisfied of the duo. If Michell had trusted their chemistry to carry the film, it could have been more than just a pleasing time filler.