It's election time in France and the socialist mayor of a little French village is aiming to gather enough funds to build a sure–fire votewinner: no, not a prison, a multimedia center. The mayor has his hopes pinned on some deep–pocketed Parisian investors for the funds, and a rustic field for the site. Unfortunately, that field has a hundred–year–old willow tree and a possible savior in an ever–ruffled grade school teacher (Fabrice Luchini, resembling a slightly less twitchy Roberto Benigni). Broken into concise chapters, Rohmer's amused feuilleton on cinema, politics, and rural life may have all the weight of a feather, but with its most pointed social commentary being "the death penalty should be abolished, except for architects," its lightness is its allure.