To begin, the title is misleading. Not having an idea as to what the film was about, we took a chance because of the ingredients that went into its making. Let's face it, anything with the divine Isabelle Huppert in it, is worth a look. Babou, an unemployed mother living in Lille, has seen better days. Now alone and unemployed, she is trying to get work wherever she can get it. Unfortunately, there is limited positions where she qualifies. Babou has a grownup daughter, Esmeralda, is engaged to a local young man, who is the opposite of what her mother is. Esmeralda resents her mother for being absent most of the time, when she needed her most. The contrast between Babou, a free spirited woman and her more responsible daughter is impressive.After Babou tries unsuccessfully to get a job at a pastry shop, she decides to go to a Belgian seaside city where she enters an apprenticeship in time share selling in a new development. Lydie, the woman in charge of the hopeful applicants is not exactly fond of Babou who stands in sharp contrast with herself. Babou is made to share one of the apartments in the complex with a bitter older woman, who clearly despises everything about her new flatmate.Babou, who makes friends easily, becomes friendly with a dock worker, Bart, with whom she begins a sexual affair. Because of her attitude toward life, Bart decides not to see her anymore, something that Babou did not really count on. Asking for an advance on her future earnings, Babou wants Esmeralda to come for a visit. Babou made friends with a homeless couple she sees from her window. She invites them to come stay in one of the unoccupied units of the complex.With her daughter's arrival, Babou decides to take her to dinner and invite the homeless couple and their dog, to a good restaurant. Esmeralda is appalled by the couple and her mother's attitude toward them and flees to go back home. After finally making a go of her job, Babou gets Lydie's recognition. When the two women go for a night where they bond along the promenade in front of the building, Lydie notices a light on an apartment that should have been vacant. Babou owns up it is her fault. Lydie tells her not to worry, but the next day, Babou is let go.With the severance money, Babou decides to gamble it on the roulette at the local casino. To her amazement, she wins a considerable amount. Her dreams of going to Rio de Janeiro becomes a reality, but before that she wants to surprise her daughter and her future in-laws at Esmeralda's wedding reception, something that no one expected. Babou finally gets an appreciative Esmeralda to recognize how much her mother really loves her. A surprising comedy written and directed by Marc Fitoussi. It was clearly a vehicle for the star. Most of it is a bit over the top, but Mr. Fitoussi was paying tribute to one of France's best stars of all times, the talented Isabelle Huppert, who is is perfect as the happy go lucky and uncomplicated woman. The film also features Ms. Huppert's own daughter Lolita Chammah, seen as Esmeralda, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Kate Winslet. The resemblance of mother and daughter is also amazing. Others in supporting roles include Aure Atika, Jurgen Delnaet, Chantal Banlier, and others."Copacabana" is fun and light. It will delight Ms. Huppert's admirers.

I saw this last month at the 2011 Palm Springs International Film Festival. Isabelle Huppert is a delight and should have been a household name in America but I guess the 57 French film star hasn't made many English language films. Huppert plays Babou, a Bohemian free-spirit non-traditionalist who drifts from job to job and has no serious relationship. Her daughter Esmerelda (played by Huppert's real-life daughter Lolita Chammah) is an uptight traditionalist who is embarrassed by her mother's eccentric dress and attitude and wants to exclude her from attending her upcoming wedding. Babou decides to reform her ways for acceptance in her daughters wedding and gets a job selling timeshares in the off season of a resort city on the Belgian coast. In the supporting cast are Aure Atika as Baou's boss Lydie, Jurgen Delnaet as Babou's temporary love interest Bart, Chantel Banlier as Babou's co-worker and roommate Irene and rounding out the cast are Joachim Lombard, Noemie Lvovsky, Guillaume Gouix, Magli Woch and Nelly Antignac. This is the third feature film for writer/director Marc Fitoussi and he has assembled a great cast of film vets for the roles but it's such a central character driven film that the supporting roles get kind of lost. It's a witty fast moving film with lots of comedy and a great performance by Huppert. Babou dreams of getting away to Copacabana beach in Rio and lately loves everything Brazilian so thus the film's title. I would have liked this film better had the other characters been a little more interesting but I would certainly recommend it and give it an 8.5 out of 10.

I'd seen a preview of Copocabana and was aware that Huppert and her on screen daughter were mother and daughter in real life... although this is very hard to pick.Babou (Huppert) is a free spirit, probably once a hippie, arty, restless, a real free spirit. The complete opposite of your middle class reviewer and indeed her on screen daughter and most of the other characters in the filmI wouldn't call Copocabana so much a comedy as a very interesting study of those us married to jobs, relationships and being settled. Versus people like Babou who blow like the wind from place to place. When her daughter announces she's going to get married and to save her mother the cost of paying for part of the wedding (and to save the daughter the embarrassment of her mother being there), her daughter tells her in laws her mother is in Brazil and won't be back to attend the wedding. Hearing this Babou is hurt. One of her men friends (plutonic as it turns out) tells her about a job selling timeshares in Ostende, Belgium. So to prove to her daughter she can hold down a job & be responsible, Babou applies for and gets this job.Arriving at Ostende we find a seafront high rise building in winter, in the off season with Babou and 3 or 4 others recruited to solicit potential buyers on the streets. Being winter and being winter in Belgium it's all a bit bleak and depressing. Aren't most movies set in Belgium slightly bleak? Betty Blue, Rosetta come to mind.Slowly though we see Babou make one or two friends. A party of people dining out invite Babou to join her at their table and here she meets Bart played by Jurgen Delnaet who has similar red hair to Huppert but must be 10 or 15 years younger. I really liked Bart whose quite keen on Babou. But once again we see the contrast how she lives from day to day, whereas he works on the wharves unloading boats and has more sense of work and routine.This is a film worth seeing and persevering with. Babou is a kind soul, we see her become a success and then... I won't spoil the ending.Is it that work, long hours, relationships, living in the one house for many years makes us dull? What are the pluses and minuses compared to being a free spirit like Babou? You'll have to make your own mind up.One things for sure I left the cinema thinking maybe there is more to life than work and maybe many of us need to be more spontaneous. Or at least have a bucket list of things to do, maybe draw these out of a hat. I've only personally known a few free spirits, restless souls like Babou. One girl who father was in the army and probably moved 25 times in 20 years. Another family of 5 where the father was a captain in the army and moved all the time. And another long lost friend, poet Adrian Rawlins who was an Australian equivalent of Babou, god rest his soul.A thought provoking and in the end inspirational movie.

Spectators who will go and see 'Copacabana' to have a good time will not be disappointed because writer-director Marc Fitoussi's last film IS a warm-hearted comedy but it is also much more than that. And it is always pleasant to get MORE than what was expected than the contrary, isn't it?What they will get first is Isabelle Huppert as Babou, the central character, frolicking, laughing,dancing in cafés, wearing flashy dresses and thick make-up. A welcome change from her usual grave, restrained, suffering self in recent movies. And with the support of a bunch of funny actors and actresses (Luis Rego, as Babou's bashful old lover; Noémie Lvovsky, as her disillusioned former friend; Chantal Banlier, irrepressible as her business rival) and well-written witty dialogs, the comedic aspect of the film is undeniably a success.But 'Copacabana' is not just a straight comedy. Marc Fitoussi's tale of an eccentric mother who tries to win back her daughter is much more complex and much richer than what you could expect. For the film is also philosophical (to what extent can you remain free in society, especially when you have children?), psychological (the conflict between Babou who wants to remain off the beaten track and Esmeralda, her daughter who wishes, as a reaction, a steady middle-class life, is well dissected), satiric (the dubious methods of time-share business are denounced), documentary (Ostend, on the Belgian sea-coast has rarely been filmed in the off-season), ethnological (the Flemish shown in the film are real people) and social (the young homeless couple episode).And the miracle is that 'Copacabana' is so well written that all these aspects blend together harmoniously. You follow this seamless story from its beginning to its end effortlessly, until the final surprise (which I am afraid will remain a surprise until you see the film).'Copacabana' is a well made film that doesn't overwhelm you but seeps into your brain and your heart. A feel-good movie that never falls into the trap of over-simplification. A kind of Gallic Capra-esquire comedy that makes love, intelligence and eccentricity meet to everybody's delight.