It stars Gérard Depardieu, Gisèle Casadesus, Claire Maurier, Maurane, and François-Xavier Demaison.

The film tells the story of an illiterate man who bonds with an older, well-read woman.

In flashbacks during the film he is seen as a child, bullied at school for being a slow reader, by both the teachers and other students, and constantly reminded by his mother that he was clumsy and unwanted, and not given much love by her although she protects him when slapped by one of her boyfriends.

He earns some extra money by selling his vegetables at the weekly farmers' market, borrowing a truck from the bar where he is a regular customer with his friends.

One afternoon Germain meets Margueritte, a delicate, 95-year-old woman who sits on the same bench with him to feed pigeons.

When Margueritte is forced to leave her retirement home for a lesser one in Flanders, she puts aside her dictionary for Germain.

In the final credits the following towns are acknowledge as locations of filming: Pons, Rochefort, Cozes, Cognac and Chateaubernard.

The website's critical consensus reads, "It's sentimental and treacly, but that's not enough to prevent My Afternoons with Margueritte from being truly affecting.