Jane Austen Wrecked My Life Cinema Review

4 star light hearted and witty French romcom.

Jane Austen Wrecked My Life is a 2025 French romantic comedy film, written and directed by Laura Piani, in her charming and well written feature directorial debut. It is presented here partly in English and mostly in French with English subtitles.

It is showing in UK cinemas from 13th June 2025, courtesy of Icon Film Distribution.

“Ever heard of the concept of ‘breadcrumbing’? It was tailor made for you. You give girls attention, in the hope of something special, but never commit. You leave everything to stew. Girls, onions…”

Agathe (Camille Rutherford – Anatomy of a Fall, No Love Lost) is a young single woman, who works at Shakespeare and Company, an English language bookshop in Paris. Thoroughly immersed in the world of romantic literature and in particular the work of Jane Austen, she feels as though she were born in the wrong century and is an aspiring writer in the same style.

She is unlucky in love and seemingly destined to be single, spending most of her time with best friend Felix (Pablo Pauly – Patients, Three Nights a Week) and living with her sister Mona (Alice Butaud – Love Songs, Dans Paris) and nephew Tom (Roman Angel – Les cadors). A strange fantasy in a Chinese restaurant provides the inspiration for a new novel and when Felix reads the start he loves it and implores her to carry on writing it.

Out of the blue, she receives a letter from the Jane Austen Residency in England, Felix has sent her work for consideration and she is invited to join them. Putting aside her fear of cars, she arrives to be met off the ferry by the very English Oliver (Charlie Anson – Pride and Prejudice and Zombies), to whom she takes an immediate dislike. He is the great great great great nephew of Jane Austen and his parents Beth (Liz Crowther – Mansfield Park (TV Series)) and Todd (Alan Fairbairn – No Man’s Land) run the retreat.

Here, among the other writers, she will begin to learn more about herself, life, love and the importance of knowing what is on the other side of a door before you open it.

“Do you have a Jane Austen for every circumstance?”

Jane Austen Wrecked My Life is a very entertaining film to watch and cleverly written and realized. It artfully blends old fashioned attitudes and modern sensibilities and the end result is a charming and very funny tale of love and misadventure.

Camille Rutherford is an excellent choice for the lead, she is clumsy and awkward and thoroughly believable and relatable, very unlike most romcom heroines, which makes the whole thing much more enjoyable.

With lots of comedy moments, a small amount of nudity (mostly bare bottoms) and a satisfying conclusion, this unchallenging but fun film is well worth a trip to the cinema.

“Where did you get the idea? Your novel. A woman who falls for the man she sees in her sake cup?”