The French character actor Jean-Pierre Bacri has a stooped gait, a weathered face and a hangdog air. This makes him the perfect touchstone for Pascal Bonitzer's lugubrious Paris-set redemption tale, a film that's positively marinated in tears, red wine and cigarette smoke. Bacri stars as Damien, a sad professor, shunned by both his wife (Kristin Scott Thomas) and his dad, and toiling to save a fetching local waitress (Isabelle Carré) from being deported. Hopes fade, and true love falters. But the performances are tart and tannic, ensuring the film goes out with a graceful dying fall.