Look at Me (review)

Hey, if you're into whiny soap operas about self-obsessed people who never shut up complaining about how miserable they are, have at it. But if you get enough of that in real life or just don't care to spend a couple hours with fake people who are that exasperating, no one would blame you for giving this one a pass, even if it is all French and foreign and probably very deep and meaningful. Lolita Cassard (Marilou Berry) is a whiny, miserable would-be chorale singer who hates her dad, Etienne (Jean-Pierre Bacri), a whiny, miserable, but successful novelist -- are novelists ever anything other than whiny and miserable in movies? -- who can't write at the moment but can spend lots of time complaining about his daughter's overweight. Sylvia Millet (the film's writer and director, Agnès Jaoui) is Lolita's whiny, miserable singing coach who can't stand how clingy and worshipful Lolita is until she discovers who her student's dad is, and how he might help Sylvia's husband, Pierre (Laurent Grévill: The Good Thief), a whiny, miserable, but unsuccessful novelist. And that's just how they start out. Don't imagine they aren't all even more whiny and miserable by the end of the film, when you will be, too.