Yet Another 'Indentify This Bit of Pop Culture I Barely Remember' Question

July 26, 2006 8:15 AM

Help me recall a film briefly, and somewhat boozily, recommended to me at a party: A woman knocks on the office door of some random professional, believing him to be her new therapist. He isn't, but pretends to be. Released in the last five years.
posted by boombot to Media & Arts (19 answers total)

It's not Mumford, is it?
posted by dersins at 8:19 AM on July 26, 2006

Mumford?
posted by jrossi4r at 8:20 AM on July 26, 2006

Didn't see you. Sorry, dersins.
posted by jrossi4r at 8:21 AM on July 26, 2006

I know the movie...damn....think it's foreign. Unless this Mumford was a remake.
posted by tula at 8:24 AM on July 26, 2006

I'm not sure if Mumford's the one you're looking for, but I remember another one that more specifically fits what you're asking about.

It'll bug me until I come up with the name.
posted by whatzit at 8:25 AM on July 26, 2006

tula: I agree with you. I'm almost certain it was French.
posted by whatzit at 8:25 AM on July 26, 2006

Ah ha! Intimate Strangers.
posted by whatzit at 8:27 AM on July 26, 2006

Best answer: I found it Amazon, but this is the IMDB link for Intimate Strangers, aka Confidences trop intimes.
posted by whatzit at 8:28 AM on July 26, 2006

Yea! whatzit.
posted by tula at 8:36 AM on July 26, 2006

Response by poster: I was going to title the question "I'll Wager I Have An Answer Within An Hour." What a dumbass is I.
posted by boombot at 8:39 AM on July 26, 2006

Damn, late to the game ! Being French, I could've answered this one in a jiffy. Starring the Fabrice Luchini, whom with many people here have a love/hate relationship.

Funny how the movie posters differ between the French and the US version. Is Sandrine Bonnaire well known over there ?
posted by XiBe at 8:58 AM on July 26, 2006

The director's earlier efforts, Monsieur Hire and The Hairdresser's Husband are among my favorites and I highly recommend them.
posted by dobbs at 9:06 AM on July 26, 2006

The IMDB credits suggest this is based on a novel (there are two 'adaptation by' credits) but there is no indication of what the novel is. Does anyone know?
posted by unSane at 9:23 AM on July 26, 2006

unSane : according to the french movie site AlloCiné, Jérôme Tonnerre wrote 30 pages of the story, which then got handed by the producers to the director Patrice Leconte. Both of them worked then to adapt those 30 pages into a full fledged movie.

Une idée originale
Jérôme Tonnerre, scénariste entre autres de Un coeur en hiver de Claude Sautet, est à l'origine de ce projet. Alain Sarde et Christine Gozlan, les producteurs du film, ont présenté la trentaine de pages qu'il avait écrites à Patrice Leconte. Le réalisateur s'y est immédiatement intéressé :"J'y ai senti la base d'une espèce de thriller sentimental. (...) Cette histoire me parlait."

Jérôme Tonnerre wrote many scenarii.
posted by XiBe at 9:44 AM on July 26, 2006 [1 favorite]

UnSane, Roger Ebert says it was from a book by Georges Simenon, although he doesn't give a title. Here's a quote from his review:

The story of Monsieur Hire was first told in a novel by Georges Simenon, that endlessly observant Belgian who wrote more than 300 books, many of them works of genius. This is one of his best stories, a study of character and loneliness. Reading the book some years ago, I formed a picture of Hire in my mind, and seeing this movie I was startled to see how closely my notions matched the appearance of Michel Blanc, who plays the title role.

As he wrote over 300 books, it may be difficult to find. I looked on Amazon, and they had about 60 or 70. I clicked on a few, but none of them looked like it.
posted by marsha56 at 10:00 AM on July 26, 2006

marsha56, I think unSane is asking about the Intimate Strangers adaptation, not Monsieur Hire which is adapted from Les Fiançailles de M. Hire by Simenon.
posted by dobbs at 10:15 AM on July 26, 2006

XiBe: At a guess, it's because (a) Fabrice Luchini is not well-known outside of Europe, and (b) an attractive female face helps sell a movie, even if the actress is unknown in the US.

It's also interesting to note the plain white vs pink and blue title text.

FWIW, I prefer the French poster.
posted by Pinback at 4:39 PM on July 26, 2006

ACK, I saw this movie but Intimate Strangers doesn't sound like it! I think the therapist in question was a female though. I think the real therapist ended up in a mental hospital herself, and so is absent from her practice, and this woman gets mistaken for the therapist. She tries to date (or ends up dating) one of the patients.

Anyone know what that one is?
posted by IndigoRain at 12:44 AM on July 27, 2006

I've always had trouble getting IMDB's trailers to play, so here's the quicktime version.

Man, could they have dumbed down that voiceover any more?
posted by rafter at 10:02 PM on July 27, 2006