France Cinema Floride, Miami Florida. November 6, 2011.
Spent some time trying to find the trailer. Not yet available but found this instead:
Stills from movie: http://www.commeaucinema.com/photos/un-jour-mon-pere-viendra,186655
Plot Summary: Chloe is getting married. As the story begins, she’s interviewing actors to play the part of her father at her wedding to a former tennis champion (played by a well-tanned and sometimes shirtless Jamie Bamber). Unbeknownst to her, two men who believe themselves to be her father are headed to her wedding to surprise her. Antics ensue as Chloe discovers her fathers and the two men get to know their future son-in-law. Jamie plays Stephen, the ex-tennis pro. he is madly in love with his fiance and over-eager to get the approval of her father. The movie is in French (English subtitles), mostly, but there are a handful of English scenes.
I wanted to get something up fast, so it's not too detailed. The amazing mods,
asta77 and ![[info]](https://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=3){kind=small}
zegeekgirl (thank you ladies!) both encouraged me to post this short version here from my page. I'll follow up with a more spoilery recap tonight after work and tonight's episode of House. Best parts:
- Jamie is shirtless for two full scenes. In one of them, there is really no reason for him to be shirtless except that the gods of French filmmaking saw fit to bless us. In the other scene, he is swimming and that giant robe seen in the move stills is nowhere to be seen on film. Thank you French film gods! Also, if I'm not mistaken, he plays most of the movie in shorts (very nice calves on display!)
- Jamie plays an American. He speaks French with a strong American accent for this part. I think many of his fans have that moment where we wait for the sound to come from Jamie's mouth – to hear what accent he will use. I’ve listened to him speak French in interviews, and this was completely different. I am awestruck at his accent work here because the he has lines in English with an American accent but then lines in French with that hard twang of an American accent on the words. Brilliant!
- Jamie’s comic timing back on display! He got huge laughs from the audience and got a bunch of funny scenes -- not just lines. The yellow ball in the stills is a running gag that winds up being really sweet.
- Jamie’s close ups. So, Jamie’s first scene on camera is a tight shot, just sort of his head and shoulders and his very blue eyes. My friend Sara came with me to see the movie. She had never seen Jamie before but lived in France when she was in school so she came along for the ride. I mention her because when Jamie came on screen she said, “WOW!” It was very loud. It was fitting! He looked amazing in every scene. Better than that, his range of expressions that he used in every episode of LOUK were back on display from confusion to pride to despondency to joy. I LOVE HIS FACE!
zegeekgirl also asked about comments that were made regarding the film by the festival producers. There wasn't much of substance, really. There were comments about how this viewing was before the French premiere and more really about the festival itself. The theatre was almost completely full. All in all – LOVED IT! I really hope it gets picked up by an American distributor, but more than that, I hope it gets remade with an American cast and Jamie gets to play Stephen again.
