MY WIFE IS AN ACTRESS *

CAST: Yvan Attal, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Terence Stamp, Nemie Lvovsky, Laurent Bateau, Keith Allen, Jo McInnes, Ludivine Sagnier, Lionel Abelanski, Valerie Leboutte, Annette Hazanavicius, Jean Abelanski, Marie Denarnaud, Jean Rachid, Cecile Guignet

DIRECTOR: Yvan Attal


Yvan (Yvan Attal) is a modest, sexually contented Parisian with adequate looks and enough journalistic skill to do well on his job as a sports reporter. Away from the newsroom and the playing field, his most spectacular success has been the wooing and wedding of Charlotte (Charlotte Gainsbourg), a zoomy movie star who is besieged by panting autograph hounds a bit too frequently for Yvan's comfort. Still, his wife's popularity--especially with male fans--is not a major problem for Yvan. Not, that is, until a boor in a bar buttonholes him and demands to know how it feels to watch his wife make love to other men in the nude. You can bet that Yvan clobbers the lout; you can also bet that he is severely agitated because Charlotte is about to take off for a location shoot in London, where she will play sizzling scenes with a handsome matinee idol noted for his nocturnal performances.

You'll be less than shocked when Yvan--by now a caricature of the suspicious husband--pops up uninvited on the closed set of Charlotte's film, only to find his wife, her leading man (Terence Stamp), and the entire cast and crew laboring completely in the buff. After all, you've seen this sort of naughty behavior before--it's been a staple of French films for close to a century. And, as always, things are far more innocent than they look. There is, of course, a reasonable explanation for this sudden outbreak of nudity, but will the enraged Yvan stick around long enough to hear it?

More important, will you really care? What should have been a lighthearted, playfully erotic romp turns out--under the supervision of writer-director-star Yvan Attal--to be a limp, thuddingly dull evening at the movies. There is no charm, no joie de vivre. Worst of all, there is no sexual chemistry between Yvan and Charlotte--even though, in real life, Yvan Attal and Charlotte Gainsbourg are man and wife. Oh, those French!