The Women on the 6th Floor

In this sociopolitical satire from director Philippe Le Guay, Fabrice Luchini stars as Jean-Louis Joubert, a Parisian stockbroker who lives with his status-conscious wife, Suzanne (Sandrine Kiberlain), in the fifth-floor flat his family has owned for three generations. Five Spanish maids occupy the far more humble rooms on the upper floor. When the Jouberts' longtime housekeeper leaves, they hire María (Natalia Verbeke), a new arrival who joins her aunt, Concepción (Carmen Maura), and four other Franco refugees on the sixth floor. Although relatively inexperienced, María does her job so well that Jean-Louis increases her pay, but withholds this information from Suzanne. Through Maria, Jean-Louis gets to know her colleagues and helps to spruce up their quarters, and before long he's learning their language, eating their food, and studying Spanish history. While Suzanne thinks he's having an affair with a client, he's actually fighting an attraction to María. When Suzanne kicks him out, he takes a cramped room in the attic, and while Suzanne isn't happy with the arrangement, Jean-Louis feels like he can finally be himself—although he can't live upstairs forever. Unfortunately, the idea of a romance between Jean-Louis and María never quite rings true. Still, this should be considered a strong optional purchase. (K. Fennessy)