Tormented trio in Let's Talk about the Rain

Here she progresses further towards comedy than usual and makes a movie that might have been termed inconsequential in less expert hands. But it is just about the nicest watch in town. If only there was a British director capable of turning so light a touch into something so properly sophisticated and charming.

Part of the success lies in the acting, particularly of Jaoui herself and the marvellous Jean-Pierre Bacri, who wrote the screenplay with her. Jaoui plays Agathe, a youngish feminist politician. She is a bit solemn and has a boyfriend who thinks she hasn’t enough time for him.

But she doesn’t much care for her childhood home in the south of France when she has to go back there for the next elections for reasons of "gender balance". Living there are her sister Florence (Pascale Arbillot) and Florence’s husband and children.

There is not much money around and Mimouna, the old housekeeper the family brought back from Algeria after independence, is not being paid and reluctantly has to think about leaving for a cleaning job.

Besides all this, Florence is having an affair with Michel (Bacri), a film-maker who is determined to further a not very promising career by interviewing Agathe as a coming female force in the land. Divorced, he is desperately worried about not seeing his son enough.

He is assisted in making his film by Karim (the excellent Jamel Debbouze), the son of the housekeeper Mimouna, who, though already married, has fallen for a white girl living nearby. He has clearly suffered the slings and arrows of racism and, visiting a cathedral, says he can’t help feeling someone is watching him as if he’s not wanted there.

Everybody is discontented with their lot in life and it is also a lousy August, rainy and unseasonably cold. Hence the title.

There is nothing here that amounts to obvious drama, but a great deal of trenchant observation. Bacri’s portrait of a man who can’t make up his mind about anything in his life, causing an impatient Agathe to consult her mobile more and more during the on-off interviews, is a real joy. He never for a moment overplays but, like the film itself, uses shrewd and gentle comedy to reveal human truths.

If you enjoyed the recent Summer Days, also from France, you will certainly like this. It tells you more about human nature than a dozen more portentous movies and is a rare delight to savour from a unique and exceptionally talented film-maker.

Let's Talk About The Rain (Parlez-moi De La Pluie)
Cert: 12A