Delicacy

Delicacy offers two love stories for the price of one: a marriage cut short by a traffic accident, and the tentative relationship between widow Nathalie (Tautou) and loveable lump Markus (Damiens) that follows. Inevitably, the course of the latter does not run smooth, as friends and co-workers cast judgemental eyes on the apparent mismatch between her porcelain beauty and his balding pate and preference for beige. But by the twinkling lights of a postcard Paris, affections grow…

Life goes on; love is blind: Delicacy’s sleeves are plastered in sentiment. But it’s not the platitudes that hobble enjoyment, but rather a tonal imbalance. Bereavement drama into fluffy rom-com just won’t go, with Nathalie’s life with husband Francois too rushed to have impact, and her second-chance romance burdened with an underlying gloom. Delicacy wants to have its gâteau and eat it: to be both affecting portrait of grief and heart-warmingly carefree, but ultimately the competing ambitions cancel each other out. [Chris Buckle]