Not Here to Be Loved

Je ne suis pas là pour être aimé (Not Here to Be Loved), a 2005 French comedy-drama written and directed by Stéphane Brizé, follows Jean-Claude Delsart, a fifty-year-old bailiff whose existence has faded into a joyless routine. Abandoned by his wife and resigned to a colourless life, he spends his weekends visiting his grumpy father at a retirement home. Everything shifts when he notices a dance studio in the building across the street and, on impulse, signs up for classes. Dancing awakens something long dormant in him, and through it he meets Françoise, with whom he falls in love — only to learn she is about to marry someone else. The film stars Patrick Chesnais, Anne Consigny, Georges Wilson and Lionel Abelanski, and was screened at the 25th Istanbul International Film Festival.