A Woman's Life

Judith Chemla shines in this Guy de Maupassant adaptation, a tale spanning 20 years of a woman’s life.

An adaptation of Guy de Maupassant’s novella, A Woman’s Life is an impressionistic and beautifully shot tale of naive Jeanne (Chemla), who faces the harsh realities of growing up as a woman in the 19th century. After being brought up in a convent she marries local nobleman Julien de Lamare (Arlaud), who very quickly and unceremoniously reveals himself to be an unfaithful and disdainful husband.

The film is partly a focused, sober piece of historical sociology, as you'd expect from Stéphane Brizé, the versatile director of modern tough-times drama The Measure of a Man - but it's also a profoundly moving drama, with a superb, career-making lead performance by Judith Chemla.