Frédéric, his wife Frédérique, and their entire clan are spending another summer in their family house deep in the verdant Provençale countryside. A solitary gay man, Hugo (whose favorite pastimes include skinny dipping) has moved in next door. After a convivial group dinner, Frédéric and Hugo stay up on the terrace until dawn, exchanging their radically different visions of love. As the conversation progresses, so do the revealing flashes of both the past and future—thereby allowing that first night of intense banter to serve as a chain for the entire arc of the two men and their subsequent relationship. Entirely unaware of their exchange, Frédérique nonetheless notices a distance between her and her husband, and the powerful bond developing between Frédéric and Hugo—one that not only affects the two men, but Frédéric’s idyllic family as well.

A second feature for actress-turned-director Zabou Breitman, The Man of My Life is a uniquely stylish film with lyrical dialogue and graceful artistry. Breitman embraces the expressive French countryside as well as other poetic elements that would have been sadly overlooked by a less sensitive director. A co-writer of the film with collaborator Agnes de Sacy, the two women succeed admirably in burrowing into the heads of the male principals—innately contrastive but undeniably drawn to each other.

ADMISSION:  $10 non-member / $8 members