Cinema: Good Work

The heroine wants it; we get it in the fine Rosetta

What would you do for a job--a menial, drudging job in a bakery or selling clothes that never were in fashion? If you are Rosetta (Emilie Dequenne), a teenager in today's depressed Belgium, the answer is anything. Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne's Rosetta, which earned this year's Cannes Film Festival Palme d'Or and a Best Actress prize for Dequenne, is the close-up portrait of a girl for whom need has become obsession.

The way medieval saints believed in Jesus, with a fervor bordering on lust, Rosetta believes in employment. Work is her religion: when she gets it, she does it harder (and...

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