Director: Dany Boon
Starring: Kad Merad, Dany Boon, France 2008. English subtitles.
Philippe helps to run the post office in a picturesque small town in the south of France. His wife Julie (Zoe Félix) has been down in the dumps, and he thinks one way to lift her spirits would be to relocate to the more glamorous surroundings of the Côte d’Azur. However, his attempts to finagle a transfer fail, and he ends up being demoted and sent to Bergues, a village in northern France. A charming comedy that has been a phenomenon in France.
In this adaptation of Francis Veber’s smash 1993 Paris stage farce, Jacques Villeret stars as Francois Pignon, a lowly accountant at the Financial Ministry who reproduces famous monuments with matchsticks. Unaware that he has been invited to join a group of people for dinner solely for their amusement, Pignon shows up at his sponsor’s doorsteps, only to discover that Brochant (Thierry Lhermitte) hazs thrown out his back. Pignon insists on making his new “friend” comfortable and while he has the very best intentions, he quite typically gets everything wrong. In the end, however, Brochant realizes that he is the “idiot” and offers to prove it by going to the next dinner as Pignon’s “guest”. Upon its debut at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival: “Abetted by an excellent cast, veteran writer Veber weaves a simple premise into comic gold.”