God's Offices (2008)
A realist dramedy about dedicated social workers who devote their long shifts to helping pregnant women.
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Good movie but grossly overrated
This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.
It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.
All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.
"Entre les murs" (2008, France) wins prizes at Cannes, and is nominated for a Foreign Language Oscar while not much is heard about the very similar movie, "Les Bureaux de Dieu" (2008, also France). Both films use similar techniques - assigning documentary dialogues to non-actors, and the effect is amazing. You don't know if you're watching a documentary or a feature film! Both movies seems like documentaries, since no rosy solutions are provided to the dramatic problems the teachers/social workers have to deal with. Both films are very talky, with no escape outside the confinement of class room/social services office, but the stories and conflicts presented here are so fascinating, you willingly stay with both films to the end.
It looks like someone who read the script prior to shooting reminded Claire Simon that film is a visual medium and, having listened and agreed made the bizarre decision to punctuate what amounts to two hours of dialogue by panning continuously from person to person where it would be more appropriate to cut. The scenes themselves are punctuated by solo, duo and trio shots of the staff at the Family Planning clinic - the main, indeed only - setting of the movie, looking down on the city of Paris, for all I know in a symbolic statement that they are better than their clients, who people the city. I checked this one out blindly on the strength of the cast which includes Anne Alvaro, Nathalie Baye, Nicole Garcia, Isabelle Carre and Emmanuel Mouret and reasoning that there was no way they could all get it wrong. We're talking semi-documentary here with a series of clients coming to the clinic and talking at length to one or more of the staff. Seems Claire Simon thinks talk is the best contraception.