Roman de Gare

It has been more than 40 years since renowned French writer/director Claude Lelouch won the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival and multiple Oscars for A Man and a Woman in 1966. But praise in the French press has eluded Lelouch, even after releasing 40 films since.

So, to test the bias of the press, and see if a good film by an unknown director would be received differently, Lelouch released Roman de Gare last year under an assumed name … Hervé Picard. The result was another trip to Cannes and the critical acclaim he had been waiting for.

A clever mystery thriller that takes many twists and turns down the paths of mystery, comedy, and romance, Roman de Gare was a box office success in France — one that made its female lead, newcomer Audrey Dana (making her film debut), into a domestic star.

The movie opens with the ending, as successful, yet desperate, novelist Judith Ralitzer (Fanny Ardant) is interrogated by police about the disappearance of her ghost writer.

In a flashback, we see Dana’s character, a single mother named Hughette, abandoned by her fiancé at a gas station while making their way to meet her parents in the country. She is forced to take a ride from a peculiar stranger, played by celebrated French actor Dominique Pinon (Amélie, Delicatessen), and then asks him to assume the role of her fiancé, so as not to disappoint her mother.

Ralitzer has ties to both Hughette (a fan) and the stranger, who may be her ghostwriter, creating a question about who has been killed and why. The identity confusion is furthered when we learn that the stranger could be an escaped pedophile on the loose, or the husband of a woman searching for a missing school teacher, and that Ralitzer may not actually use a ghost writer. Oh, and Hughette may be a prostitute and/or she may be falling in love with the stranger.

So, the question becomes who is who, who is real and who is in danger?