Thursday, March 28, 2024

Movie Review: ‘Full Time’ is an Endearing Portrayal of a Working-Class Woman


Director: Eric Gravel

Writer: Eric Gravel

Stars: Laure Calamy, Anne Suarez, Geneviève Mnich

Synopsis: Julie finally gets an interview for a job where she can raise her children better only to run into a national transit strike.


Almost two years after its premiere at the 2021 Venice Film Festival, Eric Gravel’s sophomore feature, Full Time (À Plein Temps, in its original French title), is finally here. The film is a moving and empathetic portrayal of slowly deteriorating working-class life. It plays like a thriller on occasion while remaining grounded in its dramatic sensibilities, anchored by a striking Laure Calamy in the lead role, who received a César nomination for her performance. 

Full Time (À Plein Temps) follows a single mother of two kids named Julie (Laure Calamy), who lives in the suburbs of Paris but comes and goes into the city for her job as a chambermaid in a five-star hotel. She’s having a hard time balancing her work and home life due to her struggles in making ends meet. Julie is waiting for her ex to pay alimony, and she doesn’t see her children, as the nanny takes care of them while she’s working. This isn’t the ideal situation in which she wants to be. Her constant sway from the suburbs to city life while dealing with other issues in her personal life has a toll on her. But she’s a warrior. Julie doesn’t give up that easily. She holds her head high and posture straight as she prepares for another hectic day. However, a double-edged sword of hopefulness arrives. 

One side comes in the form of a job opening at a marketing firm, which would suit her skills better than her current occupation, as Julie has a master’s degree in economics. The second side is the one that will hurt; a citywide transit strike is called into action, causing delays in her travels because she’s dependent on public transportation to get to work and back. This is where the thrilling aspect of the film’s narrative arrives. Director-screenwriter Eric Gravel shoots these scenes where Julie is running from her job to the interview or home like a chase movie, sometimes with a pacing that resembles the energetic Tom Tykwer’s Run Lola Run (1998). These nine days the film sets itself in are equally stress-inducing, saddening, and filled with hope. One minor disruption in Julie’s life paves the way for an eventual crash. The intensity of her crises increases, developing detrimental outcomes in both her work and personal life that she must try to bypass before everything comes crashing down. 

It reminds me of the works of Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, where they authentically capture everyday life while also implementing some exhilarating facets into their stories that give them a rush or kick, seen more profoundly in their latest work, Tori and Lokita. In other films, this approach might take you out of the grounded experience because it switches its tone to create more tension in these daily life situations. Yet, in Full Time, it doesn’t; it causes the viewer stress and anxiety, eventually feeling exhausted, because you believe in the character and wish everything goes right for her. The strive for eventual success fuels her constant motion, whether she’s running from one place to another or asking for rides on the street. This happens mainly because of Laure Calamy’s terrific compassionate performance and the film’s sharp screenplay. 

Gravel captures these situations, the trials and travails of a working class citizen, with empathy and care for the character, to the point where we begin to think that it is a documentary or a film based on actual events. The events that transpire throughout Full Time’s entirety have happened to many people worldwide. It feels as if the world doesn’t want her to succeed in the end. And it actually does not. Once you start searching for better and more opportunities, people set you aside because they don’t want you to be better than them. It is impossible to live in that manner, and the film brings those struggles to life, like Julie trying to celebrate her son’s birthday party with little to no money or time or trying to get to her interview in time. The miserable life of working a draining job while trying to maintain the world around you intact without collapsing is something that many of us might have experienced in one way or another. 

Full Time is one of the few movies that captures such a sensation of haste and vigor properly, with the exact amounts of suspense and pressure we might experience if it happened to us. Like in his previous film, Crash Test Aglaé (2017), Gravel shines a light on social topics centering on working-class women. However, unlike his other movie, he elaborates on those topics in a more touching and detailed way that captures the viewer’s heart. While it may have some slight problems as everything is going downhill for Julie, the film always remains captivating and relatable. 

Grade: A-

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