Heroine of a short series (two seasons and eleven six-minute episodes) acclaimed on Arte.tv, Loulou (amazing Louise Massin), a struggling single mother with devastating humor, returns, surrounded by her close guard, in other words by his very loyal friends Alice (Alice Vial), Marie (Marie Lelong) and Max (Guillaume Pottier).
The first season (2017) revolved around her pregnancy, for which Loulou was completely unprepared. In season 2 (2018), the child appears, and the troubles continue. “When we had the idea for Loulou, I had just become pregnant with my second child… With my accomplices Alice Vial, Marie Lelong and Géraldine de Margerie, we therefore wrote a short series based on the experience I was going through », underlines Louise Massin.
She adds: “By imagining that Loulou became a single mother in the second season, we frankly shifted into fiction. She has become a character in her own right: a girl who lacks self-confidence and struggles with responsibilities, but who draws strength from her whole and spontaneous temperament. Loulou struggles, without ever complaining. She resists a world full of injunctions, particularly regarding femininity and motherhood. »
Same team
Loulou therefore returns, with the same female team at the helm (direction, screenplay, dialogues), but in a very different format. Finished with the web series, time for the film lasting more than an hour and twenty minutes. “Leaving Loulou after season 2 left us a little frustrated. The brief format favored comic situations, while preventing us from installing the character in sequences where she could really confront herself,” explains Marie Lelong, one of the screenwriters.
This change in format could be tricky, causing the characters to lose punch and freshness. Against all expectations, the collective writing of the little group of friends has densified the characters. Loulou is now 36, her son, Alex, 10. The film revolves around this relationship between a single mother who is so often unadapted to daily realities and a kid who is not fooled. The comedy remains romantic, and the presence of Alex brings a welcome touch of gravity.
Crazy, lost, funny, annoying, Loulou traces her path, learns to become a free woman and a mother who can live up to it, even if she is not a model. Becoming responsible is not so easy, but she is helped a lot by her three friends with their benevolent irony.
Another strong point of the film: the characters of Raphaël (Oussama Kheddam), an astonishingly funny driving school teacher, and Jean-Luc (Patrick d’Assumçao), a fan of trampling (the practice of trampling on someone). At the La Rochelle Festival in September 2023, this large-format Loulou won the Prizes for best screenplay, best female performance (Louise Massin) and young promising male Adami (Oussama Kheddam).