Critic Reviews

Faucher's filmmaking is exquisite, Naymark's acting is luminous, and superb use of music lends a crowning touch.

A lovely, almost painfully intimate story of female bonding that never panders to its characters or its audience.

Eleonore Faucher, first-time director (and co-writer) of the French charmer Sequins, is well aware of Neymark's allure and sees to it that the young woman is seldom out of the frame.

Sequins hinges on its performances and newcomer Naymark is a marvel of quiet intelligence, endowing Claire with a complex mix of virginal purity and hormonal rage.

But if her wisp of a story rushes the simple connection between the women, the actresses fill in the details with an easy, unforced intimacy.

Thoughtful cross-generational portrait is full of familiar building blocks rendered fresh by first time feature helmer Eleonore Faucher.

Touched with eerie dream sequences, the film casts a strange spell that's enhanced by the rhythmic, almost sensual depiction of the painstaking art of embroidery.

Sequins will tax the patience of most viewers not enthralled with endless close-ups of beads and brocades.

Ultimately heads into a standard mismatched-buddy drama that would nestle nicely into a Hallmark movie of the week.

Unfortunately, Ms. Faucher's screenplay, written with Gaëlle Macé, never finds its focus or reason for being, and Ms. Naymark just doesn't have enough screen presence to make up for the lack of a story or to justify all those tenderly attentive close-ups.