The legendary French actress Catherine Deneuve plays a strung-out, wits-ended former beauty queen in Emmanuelle Bercot’s On My Way. One day during a busy lunch shift, Deneuve’s Bettie walks out of the restaurant she runs with her mother, gets in her car, and drives off in to the French countryside. That kicks On My Way into gear, and we follow BEttie as her trip takes her through a number of farm hamlets where she shares a rolled cigarette with an old farmer, covorts with young townies at a local bar, and fumbles along aimlessly. More than midway through her life, Bettie has awoken in her dark wood. A life of lovers and love-seeking has left her later life in shambles. Her daughter is estranged, husband deceased, and she still goes to bed in the room she slept in when she was little girl.
On the Road, Bettie begins to discover herself, but it is her grandson Charly (Nemo Schiffman) who is the real existential catalyst. On My Way becomes a buddy movie based around grandma, grandson relationship. It’s clear that Bercot’s film is a vehicle for Deneuve, who is able to render a edge to her conflicted, self-destructive female protagonist. Unfortunately, Deneuve is more or less the only thing interesting about the movie, which is otherwise a slight dramatic comedy stuffed with clichés and sentimentality. Like its main character, it wanders and can never quite find itself.
