On My Way

By Moira Sullivan

For the past several years, Catherine Deceive has not chosen films where she can be a diva; she is an actress that is interested in doing good work. That doesn’t bar others from others seeing her as a cult goddess. She made her career in early films such as Belle Du Jour in which she plays a high-class prostitute who in actuality is a bored housewife. Films like this brought her to fame, but in later years she began to play  women who were realistic.

There is a mystique around Denueve and in part she has contributed to it but in her latest films she lets her hair down and takes on roles that don’t always put her in her best light. Her latest film is On My Way  directed by Emmanuelle Bercot (scriptwriter for jury prize winner at Cannes Polisse, France 2011).  Deneuve provides a personal touch. She plays Bettie, a former beauty queen (Miss Brittany) who soon after winning is in a car accident of major consequences. She then decides against running for Miss France.

Years later, Bettie is in her mid 60s and runs a restaurant.  One day after years of routine and a failed marriage, she loses it and takes a road trip to get her life together or at least get away from the old one. At the end of the line is the beauty pageant reunion of winners like her from other provinces in France.  A random series of encounters brings her to a bar hosting a dart contest, having a rolled cigarette with an old man and a one-night stand with a young man in a bar. In the end she decides to babysit  her grandson to help our her estranged daughter and they make their way to the beauty pageant reunion in a plush hotel.  Deneuve pulls all of these encounters off admirably and as Bettie we are able to see here once again  in a new role that confirms her versatility and talent.

© 2014 - Moira Sullivan - Air Date: 04/02/14
Movie Magazine International