Rarely have I seen a film that so perfectly captures the balancing act of order and chaos in a single mother’s life than “Full Time” (written and directed by Éric Gravel).
Single mother Julie Roy (played by Laure Calamy) lives in the suburbs outside of Paris, France, raising her two young children and working a grueling job as a maid in a high-class hotel. With a transportation workers strike raging in Paris, shutting down most of the trains and buses in and out of Paris, Julie’s life is made even more hectic as she struggles to commute to work. She desperately wants a better job so she can make a better life for her kids and gets an interview for a marketing job. Now, she has to find a way to leave work early and get to the interview without the hotel manager finding out, amidst a strike that has paralyzed the Paris transit system.
A Film that Runs Like a Clock
There’s a synth beat that pulsates through the first few minutes of “Full Time” (French title, “À plein temps”) like a clock that perpetually sounds on the brink of triggering an alarm. It immediately sets the tone for the film and you realize this isn’t going to be a quiet character study like “Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles.” It’s a character study alright, but one with all the trappings of a thriller.
Julie Roy is always racing. In the morning she races to get her kids ready for school and make it to work in Paris on time. In the evening she races to get home and pick up her kids from her neighbor (Geneviève Mnich), who’s getting increasingly more irritated with watching Julie’s children (so much so, she makes a grim threat midway through the film that kicks the film’s tension up another notch). She’s racing to an interview or racing to get her maid work done when a hotel guest shows up early.
“Full Time” pulls no punches in showing the demanding life of a working class single mother, living paycheck to paycheck, always on the precipice of bankruptcy.
A Character Study of Single Motherhood
I admired Julie throughout the film. Laure Calamy’s performance is fantastic, and though she portrays Julie with a “stiff upper lip,” barely phased by the obstacles and trials that keep falling in her path, there are times when cracks appear and the world seems to be drowning her. At one point in the film, she has a dream of being underwater, and the symbolism is obvious.
Like the best written characters, she’s not a perfect angel. So focused is she on getting a marketing job and making her and her children’s lives better, she’s willing to get other people in trouble (or worse) to get what she wants. But it doesn’t matter, you still root for her.
The film is anxiety-inducing in the best way, it keeps you on the edge of your seat from beginning to end. There are moments in the film that will make your heart race faster than Julie sprinting to work. With a brisk run-time of 87 minutes, it’s a wonderful little jewel of a film that’s thrilling from beginning to end.
