Happenstance (film)

Audrey Tautou plays shop assistant Irène, who on the way to work takes a seat on the Paris metro opposite an older woman who tries to interview her for a marketing survey. On hearing that Irène's birthdate is 11 March 1977, the woman reads her horoscope: today she'll meet her true love, but she must be patient. After she leaves the metro, a young man sitting alongside (Faudel) tells the older woman he was born on the same day and asks her to read the rest of the horoscope.

The film then traces a range of characters of diverse ages, ethnicities and social status whose daily lives intersect with Irène and Faudel's in a variety of ways and come together at the end of the day. Seemingly trivial events—such as the throwing of stones or a shoe, the theft of a coffeemaker, a pigeon's consumption of a macaroon—determine the decisions and lives of the many characters.

• Audrey Tautou : Irène
• Faudel : Younès
• Éric Savin : Richard
• Frédéric Bouraly : Bobby
• Françoise Bertin : Luc's Grandmother
• Pierre Bellemare : Taxi Driver

The film relies heavily on the notion of chance and happenstance interacting in unpredictable ways on people's lives. It is a film whose action/plot appears heavily driven by the underlying chaos theory that gives the French film its title.

• Happenstance at the Internet Movie Database
• Happenstance at Rotten Tomatoes