This delightful and ultimately surprising Swiss movie opens with a night game of roller hockey played by a close-knit family of five on the abandoned highway in front of their house in rural France. Later they're all in the bathroom while the 20 year old daughter Judith (Adélaïde Leroux, Minouche in Séraphine) and 8 year old son Julien share the tub (yup, they're both naked). Still kind of sweet. They've lived there 10 years and consider the highway an important component of their home, spending as much time outside as they can. Julien and the middle sister Marion (about 15) cross by the broken guard rail to their school bus, the dad (Olivier Gourmet, with dozens of credits, including the excellent The Child (L'enfant - 2001) and Read My Lips (Sur mes lèvres - 2001)) drives off to work, leaving Judith to sunbathe by the broken swimming pool and the mom (the magnifique Isabelle Huppert; at 57 she is ten years older than Gourmet, but easily passes for his age with her beautiful skin so lightly made up her freckles show through. Here she is in the poster. Some of my favorites of her work are Entre Nous (Coup de foudre - 1983), The Bedroom Window (1987), 8 Women (8 femmes - 2002), and I Heart Huckabees (2004)) happily keeps house. Then they hear on the radio that the highway will be completed and things take one unexpected turn after another.
This is a confident feature-length debut for director/co-writer Ursula Meier. Watch for it to be released on netflix, but because there are about 50 movies with the same title, search for Huppert and then pick it, or you'll be wading through a lot of choices.
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