Baby Love (2008)

Waste of Money.

Highly Overrated But Still Good

Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

In Belleville, Paris, the gay pediatrician Emmanuel "Manu" François Xavier Bernier (Lambert Wilson) lives with the also gay lawyer Philippe (Pascal Elbé). When Manu decides to adopt a child, he has an argument with Philippe that does not want to spoil his life with a child and Manu hits the car of the illegal Argentinean immigrant Josefina "Fina" Maria Paredes (Pilar López de Ayala). They exchange phone numbers and Manu promises to pay the repair.When the social agent visits Manu, she discovers that he is gay and the adoption is denied. Manu calls Fina and offers a marriage of convenience, asking in return for a baby. Fina does not accept but when she is arrested by the immigration, she moves to Manu's house and accepts to marry him. They live together for a while and Manu discovers that he is sterile. But Philippe accepts to be the sperm donor and Manu and Fiona schedule their marriage. One night, Fina sleeps with Manu and they make love and Fina falls in love with him. Is Manu a closet heterosexual?"Baby Love" is a surprisingly good movie about parenthood and homosexuality, and the storyline may be resumed in a gay doctor that wants to be a father and tries adoption or using a surrogate mother. His decision affects his long-term relationship with his mate and brings confusion to him when he invites an immigrant and she falls in love with him. The story is very realistic and entwines comedy, drama and romance. Lambert Wilson is a versatile actor but the gorgeous Pilar López de Ayala is amazingly sweet and beautiful. My vote is seven.Title (Brazil): "Baby Love"

This is a thoroughly French film. It has a light dry wit running through it with many little surprises along the way. Both humorous and painfully touching at times, it's never less than attentive to its main characters and their plights.When Manu leans on his partner Phillipe to adopt a child their partnership goes awry. A gay man is not allowed to adopt in France and only married couples are allowed to have children via artificial insemination. This makes things very difficult. To be legal, Manu must marry.Given the French way with a story this could have turned into farce but the director hues to the narrow path and tells the story without getting silly. I thoroughly enjoyed this film.

I don't usually write comments after watching a film. But mid-way through this film, i decided that i must warn those who want to spend money on this. The film has great looks. It's got very nice cinematography. There are good looking people inside. But there's no passion in it. It's simply...sterile. There was no heat in it, heat that comes from human elements. The story, the relationships, the touch, everything is almost 'too' perfect.So much so that it seems cold.It's very hard to connect with any of the characters in any way. Also, the story is quite predictable. If you have never watched films about homosexuality or gay adoption, you might find the lack of heat comforting.Otherwise, you might want to avoid it. i considered the movie a waste of time.try 'patrick 1.5' or 'get your stuff.'

For his first fiction film, documentarist Vincent Garenq did not choose the easy way out: he chose to write and direct a comedy of manners about a sensitive subject: homosexuality and parenthood. Describing the life of a gay couple is delicate and may give rise to either dirty or coarsely 'comic' scenes and Garenq's first and main achievement is to have been able to show two men in love and in conflict just like the two partners of a heterosexual couple, which makes the title of the film ('Like All Others') particularly relevant. One simple example: when the couple formed by Manu (Lambert Wilson) and Philippe (Pascal Elbé) find each other again after a long breakdown, we spectators feel no embarrassment at all at seeing them exchange a kiss. We have developed a liking for the two characters in the meantime and feel good, just like when a woman and a man who have split up for a while kiss tenderly for the first time after wards. Another success is the cruel 'romance' that unites Manu and Fina (Pilar Lopez de Ayala) and then pits them against each other. The moments of shared -and later unrequited -love are filled with true emotion, particularly thanks to Ayala's radiant looks and freshness. On the other hand, Garenq manages to go through all the aspects of the question and convincingly shows how hard it is to become a gay parent (homosexuals have to show their credentials whereas ordinary parents can breed children whatever their defects) or a surrogate mother (bearing a child for another and part with it as of the delivery is no pleasure cruise). These scenes always ring true, which is no small feat.'Comme les autres' is in turn comic (Manu's repeated blunders, his family's reaction when he announces he has left his partner, will marry Fina and have a kid), moving (see above) and sociologically relevant. Wonderfully played by Lambert, Ayala, Elbé and the always reliable Anne Brochet, this film would be excellent if Garenq did not indulge in the easy solution in the end, while he had managed to avoid it throughout. Indeed by making Philippe, the man who hated babies, become a sugar daddy out of the blue, he demands a suspension of belief that is too much. At least for this writer.