– Leni Huyghe’s debut film is a discreet and moving portrait of thirty-somethings who are learning, late, how to live their own way
Leonie Buysse in Real Faces
There is something gently disarming about Real Faces [+see also:
trailer
film profile], the debut feature by Leni Huyghe, which sidesteps obvious dramatic crescendos in favour of a more observant, patient form of storytelling. Premiered at SXSW last year and now playing at the Film Festival Oostende, the film is set in Brussels and unfolds with an almost documentary-like looseness. The plot follows Julia (played by Leonie Buysse), a casting agent in her mid-30s who relocates to the Belgian capital after a breakup, ostensibly to restart her professional and emotional life. What gradually emerges, however, is a portrait of someone who is far less in control than she would like to appear, hiding uncertainty behind a carefully maintained façade of competence and optimism.
Meanwhile, Julia can only afford to rent a room. Her landlord Eliott (Gorges Ocloo) is a reclusive microbiology PhD candidate hoping to continue his research in Greenland.
Much of the film’s strength lies in its well-oiled cast, and especially in the chemistry between Julia and Eliott, which feels patiently built rather than engineered. Their bond grows through small, cumulative shifts – moments of awkwardness, play, and tentative trust – and the film is smart enough to let that evolution do the heavy lifting. Crucially, the relationship also works because we are allowed to track it from Julia’s side: she moves from initial distance to simple curiosity and, gradually, to something more genuine and deeper, as Eliott becomes increasingly involved in her daily life.
Equally rewarding is her relationship with her boss, portrayed by Yoann Blanc, whose character oscillates between childish naïveté and a form of self-centredness that never quite tips into outright toxicity. Julia often seems to assume an almost maternal role with him, navigating his ego while quietly managing her own frustrations.
The film’s first narrative pivot arrives when Julia joins a new project: the casting of a perfume commercial that requires extensive street casting. These sequences are quite convincing, seamlessly blending with the handheld, documentary-inflected visual approach favoured by cinematographer Grimm Vandekerckhove.
The camera remains close to the bodies, attentive to gestures and hesitations, allowing the impromptu nature of the auditions to shape the rhythm of the scenes. The studio castings and street encounters feel alive, unpolished, and occasionally awkward in a way that aligns perfectly with the characters’ own uncertainties. A playful guessing game between Julia and Eliott, built around quoting famous films, encapsulates this approach: lightly improvised, intimate, and revealing enough.
Pacing is one of Real Faces’ most understated assets. With a running time of 92 minutes, the film never overstays its welcome, nor does it rush towards resolution. Instead, Huyghe opts for a measured progression that allows emotional shifts to register subtly. This restraint may prevent the film from dazzling in terms of narrative originality, but it anchors it firmly in recognisable lived experience.
In many ways, Real Faces operates as a coming-of-age story for people in their mid-to-late 30s – those who may be highly qualified, who have already lived a life or two, travelled widely, and “been up and down each and every highway”, to borrow from the song the reviewer is knowingly alluding to. For them, the challenge is no longer to start living, but to understand how to live in their own way: first, by identifying what that “way” actually is, and then by finding the freedom and agency to pursue it.
It is precisely here that Real Faces resonates most strongly. The film speaks to a European – and more broadly Western – generation that often feels undervalued by its work environment, suspended between precarity and aspiration, yet still willing to test new paths in the hope of moving forward. It is a slow, sometimes uncertain process, but one that many viewers, including younger ones, are likely to empathise with.
Real Faces is produced by Belgian firms Mirage and Hélicotronc. British company Alief handles international sales.
