A Woman's Life

With Drucker single-handedly carrying the film’s emotional core on her shoulders, any minor quibbles instantly melt into afterthoughts, while her exquisite work remains at the forefront.

Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet’s intriguing, modest drama keeps its focus tight on Gabrielle but, thanks to a keenly observed screenplay and Drucker’s finely balanced performance, presents a wider view on the female mid-life experience.

A Woman’s Life is, in its own way, something almost as gratifying: an elegant, enjoyable sophomore outing that proves the breakout was no fluke.

There’s much to admire in its embrace of a thorny character, its judicious use of music and its control of pace and mood, but it rarely prompts the passion on display in its opening image.

Patches of narrative banality and fussy details are thankfully overshadowed by an effervescent lead performance which manages to unite all the messy threads into a satisfying melancholic portrait of a rigid personality who (maybe) finally learns a painful lesson in the necessity of exploring passion on her own terms.

Bourgeois-Tacquet repeatedly brushes against something deeply honest, yet hesitates to fully expose those emotions. As a result, the film remains simultaneously restrained, intriguing and especially in its ending feels strangely unfinished.

Thankfully, Drucker has enough charisma to hold your attention in even the most mundane moments.