"Forty-Year-Old Virgin" meets "Pretty Woman"

. . . That's the pitch. . . and as stated it might have various good possiblities for a comedy. But the actual premise is considerably harder to swallow: I never saw why he had to do all this.

This comes with no festival laurels, only some good box office in France, thanks to heavy promotion, and some very average reviews there. That premise (from which we are not allowed a moment's respite) is as follows:

"Life is good for Luis (Alain Chabat). He's happily single, enjoys his job and is loved, cherished and pampered by his mother and five sisters. But one day, they decide it's time for him to marry. Luis hurriedly hatches a plan…He will find the perfect woman who will charm them. . .and disappear on the day of the wedding. After that nobody will dare mention the word marriage to him again" (-- from the press kit).

The trouble with this comedy is that everything about it seems staged, beginning with the busy, heavy-handedly "comic" opening scenes of Luis's family (which includes some male members omitted from the description above) and its elaborate dining room meetings and heavy bourgeois trappings. There never was a family like this outside of a French comedy – outside of this French comedy. The rapid-fire introduction of family members – a shot for each with less than a sound bite – is typical of one of the film's main methods: it constantly throws excessive amounts of unnecessary information at you in the hopes of keeping your attention and preventing you from thinking how utterly shallow all this contrivance is. Of course in comedy the jokes must keep on coming, but information is not jokes. Luis is well off from a fancy job and has a really nice apartment of his own. Why should he feel so pressured to marry? Well, okay, this is a classic situation in traditional culture; but the film has given Luis and his family a social status that is totally non-traditional, so such pressures would easily be avaoided.

Luis is a perfume designer, richly rewarded for his efforts when they pay off, and this introduces another elaborate set of contrived scenes and characters.

Enter Charlotte Gainsbourg, and with her some fresh energy and a ray of hope. She is the sister (whom strangely Luis did not previously know) of Luis' best friend, and after exhaustive interviews of unsuccessful candidates for the fake bride, she's left.

Gainsbourg is a trouper, and a veteran of French film comedy. Those by her husband Yvan Atal were, however, much more nuanced and interesting than this elaborate piece of fluff. And Gainsbourg's gamine look is beginning to show some signs of wear (too much dieting, too many cigarettes?). She still has the charm, but maybe she might try taking it into more serious, less frenetic roles. This film forces her to indulge in some tasteless lines and tacky moments, like the notorious "caca" aside and the S&M scene.

After the wedding, which is lame, and no doubt borrowed from other film weddings rather than any known reality, Luis's mother collapses and is taken to the hospital – another of many fake gestures to liven things up.

And guess what happens? Oh, you'll never. Gaionsbourg and Chabat actually fall for each other. Wow. And then things get cute, and it's all over.

What a lot of work all this was to put together, and what a bore it is to watch! There are a great many better French comedies out there. Even among the formulaic ones we currently have The Valet/La doublure (Francis Veber), which is far more economical and amusing. Among the more interesting ones is the currently playing in New York Avenue Montaigne/Fauteuils d'orchestre, which was at the Rendez-Vous with French Cinema at Lincoln Center last year and belatedly got picked up. Or there is Mensonges et trahisons et plus si affinités-- by Laurent Tirard (who worked on this, but only as a member of a committee of overstimulated idea men) which has the likes of Clovis Cornillac to liven it up.

Another related comedy: Etienne Chatiliez's Tanguy, about a man-child who won't leave home. His hanging on with his wealthy parents is closer to contemporary European urban bourgois realities than Luis and his bossy extended family. Tanguy doesn't have to get married (though he does); he just has to move out of the house. The whole process is played for laughs, but it begins with a real situation. This doesn't.

Big mistake.

Opened in Paris November 1, 2006. Three Cesar nominations. Shown at the Rendez-Vous with French Cinema at Lincoln Center March 9 and 11 and at the IFC Center March 10, 2007. No US distributor.

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©Chris Knipp. Blog: http://chrisknipp.blogspot.com/.