In the whimsical independent film La Vie Magnifique de Charlie, creators Bobby Huntley and Nikki Wade bring to life a touching story centered around black girl loss, grief, and healing.
We meet Charlie (played by Kortnee Price), a twenty-something free spirit living in Atlanta and grappling with life after the death of her beloved younger sister. Charlie is quirky AF: scatterbrained and flighty, she speaks in hurried sentences, while maintaining an enviable wardrobe comprised of fedoras, short skirts, and oversized glasses. Her black girl magic is only marred by her inability to keep it together.
Film trailer
Charlie’s loss has left her out of sorts and her loved ones are worried: Charlie doesn’t cry, doesn’t dwell on her loss, and by all appearances, isn’t grieving “properly”. When she discovers that her sister has left a series of clues in scavenger hunt for her, Charlie, along with friends Kayla (Lailaa Brookings) and Keturah (Nikki Lashae), trapeze through Atlanta, in search of a prize that may bring some peace to her broken heart.
Charlie is the latest addition to a growing canon of independent cinema centered around young black, female protagonists, with its storytelling further enhanced by the female-heavy production team behind it, which includes cinematographer LaKisha Hughes and co-writer/co-producer Nikki Wade. Wade, an industry veteran who heads the Atlanta-based production company Divadom Entertainment says that it was important to show vulnerability in Charlie as she moved through her healing process.
“Black women carry the weight of the world on our shoulders and we move in such a way that all we know is to keep going,” she explains. “We don’t really get the luxury of being vulnerable or human. And if we do show signs of vulnerability, it’s considered a weakness. And we grieve similarly. We sometimes don’t allow ourselves to grieve properly and that’s what we see happening with Charlie.”
While it sometimes feels like a silly mix of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and your favorite episode of Girlfriends, the film also does a valiant job of addressing heavy issues throughout the film. Themes around sexual wellness are especially prevalent: Keturah hosts a sex-positive online show (where she goes by the moniker ‘Panda Kitty’), touting the importance of sexual gratification to her online fans. She’s confident and evangelical and wants other women to own their sexuality, something that was important to Wade when trying to establish the character.
An emphasis on female camaraderie and sisterhood also exists throughout the film as Charlie leans upon her girlfriends who are also young, cosmopolitan, black women. They accommodate her irrationalities, accompany her adventure through downtown Atlanta, and are a source of support through a confusing, sometimes manic grieving process.
While shot in Atlanta, La Vie Magnifique de Charlie derives influences from French cinema—the film’s narrator, heard at its beginning and end, touts an especially charming Parisian accent—and pulls elements from the early films of Spike Lee, Madonna, and Prince, making this a fun, sometimes nostalgic, sometimes current, story of sisterhood, love and healing.
