PodBill Just what I expected

AshUnow This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Anoushka Slater While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

Zandra The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

anshul2001anshul A great movie. obviously it goes beyond Indian sensibilities but it show how young people deal with relationships.I saw Louis Garrel in 'dreamers' and then I discovered him. he has tremendous screen presence and a special melancholy look in his eyes. He does comic scenes also very good in this movie.it has various sub plots but handles them very well. sub plot of relationship of Julie & Ismael, Their relation with Alice, Julie's relation with her family and her elder sister Jasmine's relation with Ismael. But real gem is acting of Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet. I am in love with him....

DICK STEEL In the running for the Palme d'Or in last year's Cannes Film Festival, Love Songs by Christophe Honore was nothing like what the writeup used in the festival synopsis would have let you believe. Either that, or I'm really dense to have trusted what was essentially a verbatim recap of only the first of three segments that this movie was split into – Departure, Absence and Return.Rather than dwell on the non-existent and off screen manège-a-trios, it's more of a tale of grief and the handling of grief after personal tragedy. It seemed like an exploration of venturing into the extremes, of being experimental for the sheer thrill of it, of trying to lead a vastly different lifestyle in other to drown all memories of the deceased, of numbing oneself in excessive, meaningless sex. I would have welcomed the viewpoints of family members in depth, as the movie did spend some time to set up those characters, only to have relegated them with sideshow treatment, nothing more than caricatures from parents who try to engage their child's friends in order to discover hidden secrets unknown to them, to siblings who hang around trying to come to grips with the loss, only to find some questionable , eyebrow raising antics leading to assumptions and quick conclusions.As a musical, the songs did feel a little out of place when the characters start to break into them, and seriously, I thought the lyrics could have been lost in translation, as sometimes I could not see how they either move the narrative forward, or speak from the heart the innermost thoughts from the characters mouthing those words. At some points it really felt a little bit forced, and have left one wondering about the relevance of those phrases sung, so while the meaning have probably been lost in me, it might be of relevance to French speakers.While the movie stars Louis Garrel, Ludivine Sagnier and Clotilde Hesme, the bulk of the screen time belonged to Garrel's Ismael. The threesome relationship between their characters weren't exactly explained, only that they are strange bedfellows sharing their nights together. While Sagnier's Julie did reveal her uneasiness at such an arrangement, Hesme's Alice already knows of the boundaries within their relationships that she cannot cross, and as they toy around those forbidden lines, any sense of angst and unhappiness get sung away quite fleetingly.In short, it's a film that lacked some crucial emotional punch, preferring to just scratch the surface and try to get away with it. Definitely trying to appeal to the niche crowd with its dalliances with hetero/lesbian/gay themes, but ultimately, came across as very forced and pretentious, trying to hammer a square peg into a round hole, if you can pardon the pun. Disappointing stuff.

lastliberal Paris, romance, love songs, and maybe a little Pedro Almodovar mixed in.Love Songs is just that - fourteen love songs, all very beautiful, probably available on You Tube, tied together with some dialog.I'm not impressed with Louis Garrel, but maybe I am not supposed to be.It is Ludivine Sagnier (Paris, je t'aime, Swimming Pool, 8 femmes) that sets my heart a flutter, whether she is singing or discussing the intricacies of three-way sex with her mum. No, there is no sex in the film, it's a romance.Clotilde Hesme is the third member of the menage a trois.Part 1 ended in a manner that I did not expect in a romantic film.Everything changed after the tragedy and a sadness came over the film as people struggled to find love and deal with loss.It was all about the music, however, and, in that sense, it was a good film.

merveillesxx In World Film Festival 2005, Alain Resnais's Not On The Lips (2003, B) gave me a good sleep, on the contrary, Honore's Love Song is such the film which I thoroughly enjoy. Consciously, I accept the nature of musical film (many friends of mine can't resist when the character suddenly sings a song), but the hardest part is the classical style of music (or an old-fashioned one). Fortunately, this film used the modern pop-rock music which is really my type.Love Songs is like a sequel for Inside Paris (2006, A+), still portrayed about Parisian people in intellectual way (mostly presented via the dialogs). The film always gave me a surprise, but the most interesting one is the third part that motioned about gay issue. From my experience, there are a lot of gay movies but I rarely see a gay musical film. The ending also made a sexual ideology of the film daringly explicit. But I can feel that many audiences can't accept the conclusion of Love Songs. But I desirably love it, very suitable of the title "Love Songs", because Love is the universal language.Things I can observe from Love Songs (It may be my wrong understanding) 1) The scenes that all three main characters sleeping on the same bed was possibly inspired from Scene from the Marriage (1973, Ingmar Bergman) 2) There was a "Nobody Knows" poster in the gay character's room. (I'm not sure about its purpose.)