LET THE SUNSHINE IN (2018)

Name: LET THE SUNSHINE IN (2018)
Item: LET THE SUNSHINE IN (2018)
Author: Steph Manthe

"A Divorced Woman’s Godless Search for True Love"

Content: -4 Intentional blasphemy, evil, gross immorality, and/or worldview problems. (To be avoided)

Entertainment Quality:

	None	Light	Moderate	Heavy
Language
Violence
Sex
Nudity

Credits →

What You Need To Know:

LET THE SUNSHINE IN is a French movie very loosely based on a 1977 book by Roland Barthes, a postmodernist leader. Unlike the book, which is composed of a man’s interior love monologues, the movie follows a brokenhearted woman’s desire to find love again by pursuing various men. Isabelle is a successful artist and divorced mother who wants to find true love as a middle-aged woman. She sleeps with several men, including married ones, only to discover each man is flawed, but perhaps she is too.

LET THE SUNSHINE IN uses intimate scenes between the protagonist and various men to tell the story. Most of it is shot in simple, uninteresting places, such as a dark bar, a cramped bedroom, and a tiny bathroom. However, it’s easy to look beyond the miniscule production values because the actors give authentic, realistic performances. That said, the movie is too repetitious, boring and sexually explicit. Also, it has a very strong Romantic worldview that includes a scene where a psychic gives the woman some advice. LET THE SUNSHINE IN pretty much lacks any redeeming qualities.

Content:

(RoRoRo, OO, LL, V, SSS, NN, AA, D, MM):

Dominant Worldview and Other Worldview Content/Elements:

Very strong Romantic, lawless worldview where female protagonist is ruled by her emotions and does everything in life out of pleasure and in a search for a man to love while refusing to think about how her actions affect others and while her moral duties to be a good mother and love her daughter fall behind, plus protagonist gets advice from a psychic, who tells her she needs to let her won light from within shine rather than seek satisfaction from others, which, ultimately fits with the movie’s Romantic worldview;

Foul Language:

15 obscenities (including some “f” words);

Violence:

Woman shoves a man out of her apartment;

Sex:

Very strong sexual promiscuity, as woman flirts and has sex with various married men, woman commits adultery knowingly, and woman fornicates with unmarried man;

Nudity:

Scenes of depicted male and female nudity, with genital areas hidden in shadows, by objects or not shown;

Alcohol Use:

Woman drinks alcohol with married men at bars, social drinking depicted in almost every scene and few conversations don’t involve a glass of wine or a beer, man confesses an addiction to alcohol but only through a conversation, and people drinking a lot end up in bed together;

Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse:

Some smoking; and,

Miscellaneous Immorality:

Strong miscellaneous immortality includes lying, bad role models, and a dysfunctional family portrayal.

More Detail:

LET THE SUNSHINE IN is a French movie about a divorced, middle-aged woman, and her desire to find love after divorce.

The opening scene is full on graphic nudity of an old man and a woman much younger than him, Juliette, having sex. After the unnecessary long-winded scene, the couples get dressed and make their way to a local bar.

Through a series of conversations, the movie reveals Juliette is a successful visual artist and a divorced mother. The man, Vincent, is an arrogant old man who tells Juliette he loves dallying with her because she is very charming, but he will never leave his wife. Vincent is a successful banker who’s very involved in the art world and gets a real kick out of knowing the daily gossip about which artists hooked up with who, and of course being a part of it. During their conversation at the bar, Juliette’s heart drops when he informs her he will not leave his wife. He rubs his slimy hands along her body, but she pushes him away, upset by his decision to stay with his wife.

A few days later, Juliette meets up with him again in a private home. They kiss and make out. Juliette is disgusted with herself for going back to him with his terrible personality and marital status. She cries at her inability to say no and forces herself to drift away from Vincent but only at the interest of another man.

Juliette meets an actor at an art gallery and agrees to have dinner and drinks with him. Although he’s the star of a running play, he reveals how challenging his life is and what a grind it has become to be an actor for a living. He admits he struggles with heavy drinking and maybe they shouldn’t pursue one another, but this doesn’t bother Juliette in the least. Desperate for love, she seduces him and brings him back to her house where he spends the night, and they fornicate.

As the movie progresses, Juliette continues to flirt and fornicate with various men. The movie focuses on intimate conversations, and the natural performance of the actors to bring it to life. There are no outstanding visuals or production elements, just people interacting with people. Although Juliette makes immoral decisions, committing adultery a handful of times, the movie depicts her as a strong, educated woman trying to find the right man to build a new life together.

The movie ends when Juliette visits a psychic to help her determine which of her past men is worth pursuing, if any. The psychic tells her to “let the sunshine in” her life more. She needs to choose herself before she relies on a man to make her happy. He encourages her to keep being open with her feelings and to continue dating until the right man comes along.

Juliette should let the sunshine into life lives more by getting out of the bedroom, but the repeated scenario of Juliette finding a new man and fornicating with him becomes a drag to watch. There’s only so much adultery and fornication one can bear before it gets boring and monotonous. The movie has a very strong Romantic worldview that includes a scene where a psychic gives the woman some crucial advice. LET THE SUNSHINE IN pretty much lacks any redeeming qualities, however.