I saw Paul and Paulette Take a Bath last month at the Soho Screening Rooms, and honestly, I found it very hard to immerse myself in. It’s the feature debut of British-French filmmaker Jethro Massey, and while I respect him for trying to make something original and different, leaning into bygone times instead of giving us a straightforward romance, the end result left me more disturbed than impressed.
The first scene sets the tone. Paul (Jérémie Galiana) is instantly bewitched by the sight of Paulette (Marie Benati), an elegant and stylish young French woman kneeling in the Place de la Concorde. She imagines what it must have been like to be Marie Antoinette at the point of execution. Paulette has this obsession with history she wants to climb into it, to reenact it, to “touch the truths” and feel the people she’s playing. From that moment, Paul and Paulette fall into a relationship that’s part friendship, part love affair, and full of long conversations about the past. Paul himself is a young American photographer who pays the bills with a boring job in real estate.
He also starts an affair with his boss, cruelly nicknamed “Goebbels” one of the film’s many baffling Nazi gags that I never understood the point of. They aren’t shocking, they aren’t funny, and they don’t add depth. They just left me scratching my head and yes, the bath in the title does arrive, but in a way that left me with a strange taste in my mouth. Paul rents an apartment in Munich for himself and Paulette, pretending it was once Hitler’s flat. In the bath together, they role-play as “Adolf” and “Eva.” Later Paul admits it wasn’t Hitler’s flat at all, which only makes the whole thing feel even more pointless and uncomfortable.
To be fair, there were details I did enjoy. Paulette is often shown eating whole lemons, and this small detail comes back later when Paul meets her family, giving it some weight. I also liked how Paul’s old camera is used and at the end of the film there is a montage of his photographs which is actually a lovely touch. On a visual level, the film works: Paris looks beautiful, the costumes feel right, and the cinematography has style.
But overall, I found the film disturbing and tonally messy. I couldn’t connect with the romance because the historical role-play and Nazi references kept pulling me out of it.
In the end, Paul and Paulette Take a Bath is unusual, bold, and very French but it’s not a film I can say I liked or will watch again.
The film opens in UK and Irish cinemas on 5th September.