‘A Second Life' Review: Agathe Rousselle, Star of Palme d'Or Winner ‘Titane,' Carries a Compellingly Off-the-Cuff Paris Movie

Yahoo

09-07-2025

Film directors, like the characters they depict on screen, can sometimes learn from their mistakes.
This is certainly the case with French DP turned filmmaker Laurent Slama, whose new feature A Second Life vastly improves on his Netflix debut Paris Is Us, which he made under the pseudonym Elisabeth Vogler. Both movies showcase similar styles and premises, following a young woman around Paris and employing tons of real people and locations, clearly without full authorization from the city.
More from The Hollywood Reporter
'Jimmy Jaguar' Review: An Atypical Hungarian Horror Flick That's More Provocative Than Frightening
Karlovy Vary Eastern Promises Winners Include 'Battalion Records,' 'In Vacuo'
1-2 Special Takes Radu Jude's 'Dracula' for North America
But whereas Slama's first film felt overindulgent and ultimately aimless, this one is held down by a compelling performance from Titane's Agathe Rousselle, playing a Franco-American with a major attitude who's desperately trying to make ends meet as the 2024 Summer Olympics begin. Short and poignant, with a terrific supporting turn from Alex Lawther (Andor), A Second Life manages to avoid most of the clichés of your touristy Paris-set drama, all while using the City of Lights to its fullest.
Shot and edited by Slama in a dense labyrinth filled with sightseers, fans, partygoers and a sizable police force, the film makes the summer games — or 'fucking games,' as heroine Elisabeth (Rousselle) calls them — both a backdrop and a key player in the story. Working in a concierge service renting out luxury apartments to demanding clients, Elisabeth navigates an urban gauntlet during two action-packed days, hoping to garner good customer ratings and land both a steady job and a work visa.
Since she's clearly French, it's a bit confusing why Elisabeth mostly speaks English and strives to get legalized, but Slama eventually answers these questions: Born abroad to Franco-German parents and raised for a time in the U.S., she's a stranger in a strange land who's trying hard to make Paris her home. She's also inflicted with an auditory ailment that requires her to wear hearing aids — a fact that allows Slama to keep messing with the sound design, enhancing the overall sense of disorientation.
Hostile and unwelcoming, Elisabeth actually comes off like a typical Parisian, ill-suited to the task of accompanying obnoxious rich people into their overpriced rentals. The film's early sections track her from one flat to another, with the camera rushing alongside her as she races around town. These moments recall another Paris-set drama: Benoit Jacquot's A Single Girl, which followed Virginie Ledoyen in real time as a luxury hotel chambermaid with a big personal dilemma.
Elisabeth has some big issues as well, suffering from a nasty breakup and contemplating suicide in the opening scene. She's in no mood for small talk or even a vague smile, which is why her run-in with an unusual client, the chatty, flighty and extremely chill Elijah (Lawther), looks like it will end in yet another disaster. But as the latter decides to stick with Elisabeth throughout the rest of the day, and then some, A Second Life winds up transforming into something unexpected: not a romance, per se, but a chronicle of a budding friendship between two young people in need of genuine human affection.
Yet another movie comes to mind here: Julie Delpy's Two Days in Paris, which also followed a French-American couple in a city jam-packed for its annual Fête de la musique. The difference here is how much Slama's film seems to be off-the-cuff and improvised, as if the actors were mostly playing themselves, while those around them are only vaguely aware a movie is being made (we do see bystanders occasionally look at the camera).
This DIY approach befits a story about two wayward millennials who want to live freely but are each pinned down by mental health struggles, whether it's Elisabeth's depression or Elijah's panic attacks. Thankfully, the latter is also a gifted hypnotist — he's in town to work with pro athletes — and at one point he finally manages to crack Elisabeth's hard shell, calming her nerves during an impromptu therapy session at the Buttes-Chaumont park.
The film can get a bit treacly during such moments, especially when Slama repeatedly inserts shots of Monet's famous Water Lilies paintings — or else of the artist's scenic gardens out in Giverny. If there ever was a clichéd tourist attraction along with the Louvre and Eiffel Tower, this would be it, although the director does manage to give it greater meaning toward the end of the film, explaining how Monet's work is ultimately a masterpiece in which the nearly blind painter triumphed over adversity.
Otherwise, the director mostly sticks to reality, grounding his movie in Rousselle's tough and touching performance. After going beyond the call of duty in Julia Ducournau's Titane, her first feature, the actress shows she can play a character dealing with more mundane issues than say, getting impregnated by a Cadillac. Her Elisabeth feels very much like a young woman of our time, striving to make it but refusing to compromise herself, especially when we see her turn down a high-profile job offer from a tech guy. Slama smartly keeps his camera focused on her from start to finish, revealing how exhausting it can be to settle in a beautiful city that keeps rejecting you, until it suddenly opens its arms.
Best of The Hollywood Reporter
The 40 Best Films About the Immigrant Experience
Wes Anderson's Movies Ranked From Worst to Best
13 of Tom Cruise's Most Jaw-Dropping Stunts