‘The Rose Maker’ Review: Lightweight French Comedy Takes Time to Smell the Flowers
variety.comGuy Lodge Film CriticThe words “War of the Roses” take on a lighter meaning in “The Rose Maker,” a sweet, gently scented French diversion that is likely to teach you far more than you already knew about hybridizing flowers, even if it doesn’t have a whole lot else to say.
Following veteran rose farmer Eve Vernet as she attempts to keep her family business afloat in the face of soulless corporate competition — even if it entails a little botanical skulduggery — Pierre Pinaud’s short but unhurried film benefits immensely from the warmly flinty presence of Catherine Frot (“Marguerite”) in the lead, lending a sense of purpose and personality to a character without much color on the page.Outside her performance, “The Rose Maker” is short on texture and shading, except when it comes to the spectacular multi-hued roses bred by Eve, and caressed by DP Guillaume Deffontaines’ camera with dewy reverence.
Pinaud and Fadette Rouard’s screenplay (written with contributions from, among others, “Cycling with Molière” director Philippe Le Guay) ambles cheerfully through multiple genre pivots — a caper comedy one minute, a sentimental family drama the next — without ever quite filling in the backstories of its characters, or the emotional ties that bind them.
Still, such shortcomings are unlikely to prevent this easygoing Music Box release from connecting with a mellow arthouse audience as it hits U.S.
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