A delightful and surprising change of pace for the revered filmmaker Claire Denis, Let the Sunshine In is a romantic comedy of a very special, very unformulaic, kind. The radiant Juliette Binoche gives a complex performance as a divorced painter who sets off in mid-life in search of love. Starting with an affair with a particularly obnoxious banker (she’s turned on by his boorishness), her erotic encounters include an actor, a fellow artist, her ex-husband, another artist, and even a strange fortune teller, played to enigmatic perfection by Gerard Depardieu. Wry, wise and thought provoking, Denis’s very personal work explores a woman’s search for love in all its foolishness and glory.

Though the subject is ostensibly lighter than most of Denis’s ouevre, the considered formalism and arresting sensuality of her filmmaking style brings a satisfying gravity to a story of feeling star-crossed in love in the city of light.