Novelist Margaret Atwood has compared relationships between men and women to potted plants — "a little pruning, a little watering, a little weeding, and straightening up to bring out the best in me." That pretty well describes the theme of this relaxed and entertaining French film directed by Martine Dugowson and set in Paris.
English fashion designer Ada (Helena Bonham Carter) has just moved into a new apartment with screenwriter Paul (Jean-Philippe Ecoffey). She's obsessed with her mentor (Jean-Claude Brialy) while he's attracted to Lise (Romane Bohriger), a young fashion designer who has impulsively fallen in love with him. Paul's energies are depleted by his writing partner Guido (Sergio Castellitto), who's mourning the loss of his girlfriend who found him sexually inadequate.
The other friends in this circle of artists include Alphonse (Miki Manojlovic), a womanizing producer; Emma (Elsa Zylberstein), a woefully untalented aspiring cabaret singer; and Yves (Yvan Attal), a film director married to Nina (Marie Trintigant). All of these lovers come to realize that tending to their relationships requires pruning, watering, and weeding.