In order to avoid exposure and possible prosecution, George and Bronte must manufacture an instant marriage. Anyone who is uncertain about his or her spouse’s favorite vegetable will find this alarming, since the film assumes married couples must know all sorts of minutiae about each other and have the happy-family Polaroids to prove it.

The film’s charms are as picture-perfect as anything George and Bronte manage to manufacture. Ms. MacDowell, as the woman who makes this extraordinary deal in order to live in houseplant heaven (an enchanting set with an indoor fountain and solarium), is a lot more warmly appealing than that description may make her sound; she has a lovely, demure ease that makes George’s appreciative gaze quite understandable. Mr. Depardieu, in the role that gets him into a New York Yankees cap, proves that he is nothing if not a sport.

–Janet Maslin, The New York Times.