August 30: International Day of Disappeared Persons; On Saint Catherine’s Day, All Trees Take Root. For several days now, a mysterious stranger has been scattering a proverb a day across Paris, each one written on scraps of paper left in taxis or scrawled in chalk on walls. Nobody pays much attention at first, but the proverbs insidiously slip into people’s lives, getting them to think about the relationships they maintain with their nearest and dearest, with love and friendship, and with the life they’ve chosen to live.
And so we follow the thoughts and daily lives of Diane, the cab driver; Agnès, who dives into troubled waters and finds clues to Parisians’hidden lives there; Angélique, a gentle woman who painlessly chose to withdraw into her apartment, and Edmé, the off-beat vagabond/guardian angel who succors lonely outcasts from modern life. Their paths will cross, just miss or affect each other, composing a modern legend that leaves ample room for friendship and a future where fear and frustration no longer govern humanity’s life.

Composed along the same lines as Rêve général (Nation of Dreamers), i.e. a chapter per character, A Silhouette’s Not Much describes modern life through ordinary individuals who are mirrors to us all.

Diane, Edmé, Agnès and Angélique are all intrigued by the proverbs that have been cropping up across their city. Who’s writing them? And why? The maxims get each of them to reflect upon the meaning of their lives, and why they chose to live that particular life. The unsuspected impact of those short lines will change all of their lives, some just a bit, others dramatically. Once again, Nathalie Peyrebonne proves how skillfully she can portray her characters’ feelings, and gets us all to think about the lives we’re living.