André (Jamel Debbouze) is at the end of his rope. An American living in Paris, and a perennial loser, he owes money to all the wrong people and he’s run out of time before they collect.

Staggering from one desperate solution to another, he finally ends up hanging off the side of a bridge, all ready to leap into the Seine. But before he can, he notices that someone else has had the same idea – the improbably statuesque Rie Rasmussen has appeared as if from nowhere. And when she jumps first, André has to put his own suicide plans on hold to rescue her.

As if the stunning looks weren’t enough of a giveaway, we soon discover that this woman, who introduces herself as Angela, is a little unusual – of course, if her true and heaven-sent identity was supposed to be a surprise then the title was a little misjudged. Angela has been sent from above to teach André a few life lessons, to show him his inner beauty and to solve a few of his more practical problems as well.

Luc Besson’s last film, seven years ago, was the superb and ill-received Joan-of-Arc biopic The Messenger, and he’s been awfully quiet on the directing front since then. Probably the last thing anyone would have expected was a romantic comedy about angels, and it’s a brave move at least, one bound to confuse those who know him from frenetic action flicks like Nikita and Leon. It also places his film up against some pretty stiff competition, in perhaps the world’s smallest sub-genre. The concept – suicidal guy rescued from bridge by heavenly intervention – draws inevitable comparisons with It’s a Wonderful Life, while the slow pacing and Thierry Arbogast’s luminous cinematography recall Wenders’ classic Wings of Desire; but Angel-A isn’t really a patch on either.

Part of the problem is that it doesn’t have an awful lot to say – its point that there’s good in André and by extension in everyone is valid enough, but nothing that you wouldn’t find in a thousand self-help guides – and Debbouze does his best to undermine even that by making his character fairly unlikeable for most of the film. And while it’s easy to understand André falling for a gorgeous woman who does anything he asks and has angelic superpowers (including the ability to wallop gangsters), it’s less plausible to imagine Rasmussen looking twice at Debbouze, meaning that many of the romantic moments feel more like adolescent wish-fulfillment. Even the comedy falls a little flat – the two stars play well together, but their performances conveys more humour than the script itself does.

In the end, Angel-A is a great advert both for Paris and for angelic intervention, and it’s absorbing and charming enough for the length of its short running time – but for a director of Besson’s caliber, that makes it a hell of a disappointment.