The opening montage of Joséphine s’arrondit (2016, directed by Marilou Berry) catches up the audience on everything that has happened between the first Joséphine movie and this one. Mostly, everything is great between Joséphine (Berry) and Gilles (Mehdi Nebbou). They’re in love, living together and happy.
And then Joséphine gets pregnant. Dozens of pregnancy tests confirm this. She and Gilles have to navigate this new era of their lives and Joséphine has to find a new balance between her family and friends.
Much like the first movie, the sweetness of this carries it far. It’s maybe even less related to Pénélope Bagieu’s original comic (although Joséphine was pregnant when that comic ended) and Berry’s direction pushes it into a broader, often more slapstick territory. Berry, who also cowrote, is definitely playing to her strengths, though — she has such an expressive face and fearless physicality. Her affection for the character of Joséphine is clear and while she’s willing to look ridiculous, the movie is never laughing at her.
Subplots with her depressed sister (Vanessa Guide, replacing Alice Pol) and Joséphine’s friends don’t go much of anywhere (I mean, of course, she’s going to be a bit preoccupied and not as interested in her friends’ love lives) but at least round out the world. Gilles is given a bit more to do as he’s trying to find stability in both the new pressures of pending fatherhood and a huge project at work and Nebbou brings such a kindness to the role.
The conflicts between Joséphine and Gilles also feel real. They’re both stressed and trying to work through something they weren’t planning for. I do feel like their fight was resolved a little too easily, but that’s also who these characters are. They love each other and are so compatible that they were never going to be apart for too long.
It’s a pretty light movie (other than a weird moment of blackface, but it’s France …) and I definitely enjoyed it while I was watching it — Berry is really that cute as the title character — but it was also vaguely forgettable. I had fun but I didn’t really think that much about it afterward.
This was given an English title of Joséphine, Pregnant and Fabulous, but I can’t figure out if it was ever actually released in the U.S. (I watched it in French with French subtitles.) If you haven’t seen the first one, this probably won’t really stand alone. And even if you have seen the first one, this isn’t particularly worth seeking out, unless you know French and want to spend money on the DVD.
Still, part of me would enjoy catching up with this version of these characters again as they deal with parenthood.
