J Paul Johnson
Written and directed by Éric Gravel, Full Time is hardly the first French film to open with a tight and lingering close-up of a female body’s skin and the sounds of deep breathing. But those deep sighs are of exhaustion, not exhilaration or ecstasy, and their source, the film’s protagonist Julie (a profoundly affecting Laure Calamy), a victim of an unrelenting fatigue. Deep and alone in her sleep, it’s about the only time in the film’s 88 minutes Julie is at rest: from this moment on, she’s going to be engaged in a full-on, full-time, mortal panic.
Gravel’s film nimbly adopts the technique and tropes of the modern thriller film, but Julie’s goals are in comparison to most espionage fare rather mundane: she’s in it, so to speak, simply to survive another day of managing her two children, her failing finances, and her demanding job. Full Time feels a bit like Tom Cruise in a Mission Impossible installment racing against time and obstacles to reach his destination, only if his destination were an office interview for a slightly better job or to pick up the kids from the sitter. And it’s brilliant, because there is clearly a message to Gravel’s method.
Calamy’s Julie is a single mother caught in a vicious cycle of modern-day life. With her alimony payments having disappeared along with the ex-husband now ghosting her, Julie’s finances are precarious. She’s adept at her job as a head chambermaid in a five-star Parisian hotel, but the job’s grueling demands and long commute from her remote suburb have her running on fumes. Each day is a tension-filled cauldron of getting her two children ready for childcare, navigating transport to the city, fulfilling her extensive duties, and making it home in time for her children, only to repeat the process ad infinitum.
Julie’s is a situation that simply cannot sustain itself. Any disruption—such as the seemingly endless transport strikes that bring metropolitan commuter traffic to a crawl—threatens her already-jeopardized livelihood. Her boss is tired of her excuses, her sitter tired of extra hours, her children tired of missing their mother, and most of all, Julie is just damn tired period. Only occasionally does a ray of hope brighten her day: a chance meeting with a handsome (and handy!) neighborhood dad or, more importantly, a job interview for a better, white-collar position more suited to her skill set. But even sneaking out to an interview while calling on co-workers to cover for her is its own precarious tightrope, as obstacle after obstacle piles up in front of her.
Nothing about the plot seems on surface to be especially earth-shaking, but that’s Gravel’s point. Every scene in Full Time is shot like an espionage thriller, with a pulsating techno score keeping the beat (courtesy of Irène Drésel) while the handheld camera and rapid-fire editing (Mathilde van de Moortel) propels Julie relentlessly from one scene to the next at a frenetic pace. Viewers will find themselves in a panic wondering just when Julie’s fatigue and desperation will endanger herself or worse, her children. There are none of the kidnappings, ransoms, heists, or apprehensions that mark your typical thriller fare, but nonetheless Gravel and his crew invest all of the hyperkinetic energy of the genre into a what is a fairly generic, if no less affecting, domestic drama of child care and job interviews.
The curious hybrid is marvelous to look at and listen to. It’s kind of like mashing up Sight & Sound‘s controversial new “Greatest Film of All Time” Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles‘s plot with the pace and style of Run Lola Run. Full Time is no mere exercise in bricolage, though: Gravel makes clear that our current system of capitalist pursuits and exploited workers unsustainably benefits none of the 99-percenters and women especially for the worse. Just making ends meet is itself an exercise of Herculean effort against all odds, supremely fatiguing and ultimately unfulfilling.
Calamy is excellent as the woman and mother trying to cope with the unbearable tensions of modern life. In spite of all that her hectic life throws at her, she manages to keep juggling her duties, even as her patience wears thin and her judgment starts to fray. As Julie’s perilous situation reaches a breaking point, viewers will wonder how can Full Time end? With a clear objective definitively achieved or failed? With a crisis made worse by her fatigue, or one perhaps ever-so-nearly averted? With a rash choice compounded by even rasher consequences? Or worse, even than that: an infinite consignment of sorts to the meaningless merry-go-round on which she’s already entrapped?
I’m certain not all viewers will find the film’s ending satisfactory. I’m on the fence, myself, but not for a pulse-pounding moment did Full Time disappoint. Clever in its style, unique in its approach, convincing in its performance, and revelatory in its meaning, Éric Gravel’s film is well worth a watch from any viewer interested in the lives of women and any cinephile invested in the potential of the medium.
Written and Directed by Éric Gravel and starring Laure Calamy, Full Time appears in select U.S. theaters beginning February 3, 2023. In French with English subtitles. A Music Box Films Release.
