The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun

Dany Dorémus (Freya Mavor) is a secretary: short-sighted, shy and mostly overlooked by those around her. When she is asked to return the elegant sports car of her boss Michel Caravaille (Benjamin Biolay), she follows a sudden impulse and drives south instead, to see the sea for the first time. But the journey soon turns mysterious: complete strangers claim to have seen her the day before, and before long something turns up in the boot that makes Dany a suspect in a murder case. Comic artist and director Joann Sfar (“Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life”) adapts Sébastien Japrisot’s 1966 crime novel as a stylised psychological thriller with a retro look that relies more on atmosphere, colour and misdirection than on strict logic. The film is carried by the images of Belgian cinematographer Manuel Dacosse and a commanding Freya Mavor. Sfar’s direction is supremely elegant, though at times style seems to matter more than story. Japrisot’s novel had already been filmed by Anatole Litvak in 1970. At Belgium’s Magritte Awards, Sfar’s version won Best Costume Design.