Funny French films

Chuchote

Any recommendations? I'd like to throw Le diner de cons into the mix - a successful young publisher finds his life goes to pieces when he tries to victimise a good-hearted taxman; Rien a declarer - French and Belgian customs cops are forced to co-operate by the EU; 9 mois ferme - a talented lawyer discovers to her surprise that she's pregnant - and then that the father is a horrifying psychopath.

HalloweenJack

Cyrano de Bergerac is brilliant. Been a while since I saw it so can't remember exactly how funny it was but I know there's a fair bit of humour involved.

shrapnel222

les tontons flingueurs: fantastic black and white crime comedy from the 60s

les bronzes and les bronzes font du ski: 2 classic french silly comedies from the 80s

le pere noel est une ordure: another french classic.

man bites dog: belgian dark comedy.

la cite de la peur. comedy by "les nuls", one of the best group of humorists during the 90s

les valseuses: cult movie. erotico comedy with depardieu and patrick dewaere from the 70s

RRRrrrr!!!: very funny silly prehistoric comedy


just a few that came to mind :pac:

leakyboots

La Cite de la Peur is good alright. Maybe it's just the French sense of humour but I don't find their comedy particularly funny to be honest (I speak French well), it seems a bit... juvenile

darkdubh

leakyboots wrote: »

La Cite de la Peur is good alright. Maybe it's just the French sense of humour but I don't find their comedy particularly funny to be honest (I speak French well), it seems a bit... juvenile

I like French cinema in general but I have to agree, I find their comedies hard going. The sense of humour seems very obvious.

shrapnel222

leakyboots wrote: »

La Cite de la Peur is good alright. Maybe it's just the French sense of humour but I don't find their comedy particularly funny to be honest (I speak French well), it seems a bit... juvenile

you're probably right. In isolation, it's maybe not for everyone (and especially not foreigners who don't know les nuls).

les nuls grew as a comedic force because they had a daily section in "nulle part ailleurs", a daily chat show on canal plus during the 90s, which everybody watched as it was a cut above everything else, and had some fantastic presenters (Antoine de Caunes being one of them).

Les nuls were irreverent, totally bonkers, and a very marmite kind of humor. A lot of the time they performed live and often struggled to keep a straight face. i loved them personally.

shrapnel222

darkdubh wrote: »

I like French cinema in general but I have to agree, I find their comedies hard going. The sense of humour seems very obvious.

Like in every country, there are very obvious comedy films and plenty of subtle comedy films. it looks like you've only happened to watch the former.

wally79

Delicatessen

Chuchote

darkdubh wrote: »

I like French cinema in general but I have to agree, I find their comedies hard going. The sense of humour seems very obvious.

Really? I love their crazy comedies!

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

I quite enjoyed "Jeux d'enfants" with Marion Cotillard and Guillaume Canet. I think it was a comedy.

Chuchote

Le Viager.

bellylint

Le placard, I thought was very good. Bland mild mannered guy finds out he is about to be fired and then takes some actions to try to make himself unfireable.

Chuchote

Le placard looks like fun, but I've become cautious of Daniel Auteuil; haven't really liked him in any comedy I've seen him in. Especially didn't like one where he was supposed to be falling in love with a black office cleaner. The actress playing the cleaner was superb, but he was just… awkward. He has a tendency (for me) to somehow seem a little false.

bellylint

Chuchote wrote: »

Le placard looks like fun, but I've become cautious of Daniel Auteuil; haven't really liked him in any comedy I've seen him in. Especially didn't like one where he was supposed to be falling in love with a black office cleaner. The actress playing the cleaner was superb, but he was just… awkward. He has a tendency (for me) to somehow seem a little false.

It might work in his favour in this particular role, the character is meant to be awkward, but I understand not being able to get past an actor

jaysisjames

I don't know if they speak French or not, as its Belgian film, but "Aaltra " is one of the funniest movie I've ever seen.
Its about 2 warring neighbours who are disabled by a farming machine, so go to finland to confront the machinery owners.
To say its a dark comedy is an insult to darkness!

"les valseuses", mentioned above, is a belter as well

hurlingman97

The intouchables is very funny imo

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0V8ZJ_8qARs

Anongeneric

I can't recall the name but I think it translates as 'The Suitcases' or something like that,

Gerard Depardieu is a middle-aged conman working with a younger conman carrying out scams across France,

One particular scene stands out when Gerard is teaching the younger conman how to screw a woman properly,

"No no, not like that get off her and I'll show you,
Fast fast, then slow slow, fast fast then slow slow, now you try"

All this time the poor lass is on the verge of a great orgasm only for Depardieu to stop proceedings to give more tips.

If anyone knows it pleae tell me the name

exaisle

"Amelie" is subtly funny but also stylish, clever and charming at the same time...

btw...great idea for a thread...

Mountainsandh

Anongeneric I can't think of what movie you're saying with Depardieu ...

... but a real classic, actually two, are La chevre (the Goat), and Le grand blond avec une chaussure noire (Pierre Richard not Depardieu in this one).
These are brilliant, with Pierre Richard. He acts the blundering fool, while Depardieu is the smarter, angry guy.
With the same duo you have Les comperes, and Les fugitifs.

All the Louis de Funes movies were brilliant at the time : Rabbi Jacob, Le gendarme de St Tropez, La Grande Vadrouille, La soupe au choux was hilarious (I was young...).
Louis de Funes was a very old style, simple comedy style, I can't remember how you call it, more practical jokes, falling, acting angry than deep stuff.
In this extract, Louis de Funes is the very antisemitic guy who is disguised as a rabbi, and thrown into the ring for dancing. He turns out to be brilliant, against all expectations https://youtu.be/ufs4mbXrf3M

More recently Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis is a very nice little comedy. A lot will be lost on foreign viewers because the language is a big part of it, but I think you can still get the gist of it, and a lot of the jokes. It's about a guy that is landed with a postman's job in the worst place you could ever think of : the North, where they're all supposed to be freezing, thick drunkards who can't talk properly (obviously it's all about his preconceived ideas and the reality)

Camping (and the sequels) are films featuring Frank Dubosc. He's normally a stand up comedian, but created this character called Patrick, who acts all macho guy but is really soft inside, and very easy to like. Patrick loves to go camping in the same campsite every year, he thinks he owns the place, meets all the usual gang there, and thinks he's the biznizz with the ladies.

I don't know if you'll get that humour, but yeah, it's pretty funny for me anyway. Also just nice, like touching nice, about friendship. The catchphrase from the first movie is : "Alors ? On n'attend pas Patrick ?" That's him talking about himself in the 3rd person https://youtu.be/iiNIKedJAkE

Le Petit Nicolas is a cute comedy suitable for kids too, but I enjoyed it myself.

Les Tuches was Ok, not brilliant but you'd watch it. It's about a poor family who suddenly win money and change to a lifestyle of luxury.

My sister keeps telling me to watch "rrrrrrrrrrrr".
I haven't got around to it, but from the bits on Youtube, there seems to be really funny moments, don't know about the whole movie.
It's in the stone age, "l'age de Pierre" in French, so they're all called Pierre, and evidently, they can't make the sound "G".
It's very much the same kind of humour as "Les Nuls", so if you didn't like La cite de la Peur, you may not like it.
https://youtu.be/HaZbssQXHqY

storker

There's Gazon Maudit which I saw years ago and remember as pretty funny, in which a wife moves her lesbian lover in with her and her husband. It stars Josiane Balasko who also starred with Gerard Depardieu in Trop Belle Pour Toi which, while not side-splittingly funny, certain had a good few (darkly) funny moments.

La Cage aux Folles, the original French version of The Birdcage is also worth a look.

two wheels good

Jacque Tati's films of course. Classics. Monsieur Hulot.

Xenji

Taxi.

Victor

Sitcom, but it's hardly one to watch with your granny:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sitcom_(film)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0157044/?ref_=nv_sr_2

Steamy

A Town Called Panic is a fantastic movie. 

It's nonsensical in the best way possible.

Chuchote

Anongeneric wrote: »

I can't recall the name but I think it translates as 'The Suitcases' or something like that,

Gerard Depardieu is a middle-aged conman working with a younger conman carrying out scams across France,

One particular scene stands out when Gerard is teaching the younger conman how to screw a woman properly,

"No no, not like that get off her and I'll show you,
Fast fast, then slow slow, fast fast then slow slow, now you try"

All this time the poor lass is on the verge of a great orgasm only for Depardieu to stop proceedings to give more tips.

If anyone knows it pleae tell me the name

Les Valseuses? Though Depardieu was young in that. (Title means The Bollocks, not The Suitcase.)

shrapnel222

thought of a few more:

Dikkenek: fantastic crazy belgian comedy

asterix et obelix mission cleopatre.

les visiteurs

oss117

Qu'est ce qu'on a fait au bon dieu?

for a more subtle comedy: cuisine et dependances

and not to forget brice de nice and brice 3 (both have some great moments)

Chuchote

And the Taxi! series.

Anongeneric

Cheers for that Chuchote,

That's the one.

It's been a few years since I watched it, no idea how my memory changed the details so much!

Good movie, well worth a watch for those who haven't seen it yet.

Chuchote wrote: »

Les Valseuses? Though Depardieu was young in that. (Title means The Bollocks, not The Suitcase.)

Deub

I like movies with dark humour and Les bronzés font du ski and man bites dog (C'est arrivé prés de chez vous in french) are my 2 favourites.

TCDStudent1

im sure it's been mentioned already but I know nothing about French movies. When I lived in France, people would always talk about a comedy where a guy from southern France goes to live in northern France. He had difficulty with the northern accent and customs. French people would always smile and start talking about different scenes in that movie. Can anybody tell me the title?

Chuchote

TCDStudent1 wrote: »

im sure it's been mentioned already but I know nothing about French movies. When I lived in France, people would always talk about a comedy where a guy from southern France goes to live in northern France. He had difficulty with the northern accent and customs. French people would always smile and start talking about different scenes in that movie. Can anybody tell me the title?

Bienvenue chez les ch'tis (in English, Welcome to the Sticks).

Apparently there's an Italian version that's also very funny.

First time I saw this I snorted tea straight out of my nose; sent it to a Belgian friend who fell off the couch he laughed so much!

UsedToWait

TCDStudent1 wrote: »

im sure it's been mentioned already but I know nothing about French movies. When I lived in France, people would always talk about a comedy where a guy from southern France goes to live in northern France. He had difficulty with the northern accent and customs. French people would always smile and start talking about different scenes in that movie. Can anybody tell me the title?

Mountainsandh wrote: »

More recently Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis is a very nice little comedy. A lot will be lost on foreign viewers because the language is a big part of it, but I think you can still get the gist of it, and a lot of the jokes. It's about a guy that is landed with a postman's job in the worst place you could ever think of : the North, where they're all supposed to be freezing, thick drunkards who can't talk properly (obviously it's all about his preconceived ideas and the reality)

?

TCDStudent1

UsedToWait wrote: »

?

Sorry, missed that post!

Mountainsandh

It's great craic, with a great cast, worth seeing. The reason language may be an issue is that the accent and lingo up there are so different from the rest of France, and the newbie is gradually learning it all, really funny though.
French people of course adopted all the lingo and phrases from the movie for a while, everybody was speaking Chti

Chuchote

Another one that became a cultural trope was La vie est un long fleuve tranquille, which mocks the ultra-Catholic bourgeois: a long-patient mistress who has been waiting for her obstetrician lover to fulfil his promises of marriage becomes enraged when his wife dies and he makes it clear that she can go whistle. She swaps the tags on the two most recent babies he has delivered - the little girl born to a flaky family living in the flats, and the little boy born to a super-wealthy and very conservative Catholic family. Fourteen years later the deception is discovered, and the wealthy family reclaims its son (while hanging on to the daughter they've raised, but not telling her). The son takes to wealth and privilege like a duck to water, but keeps in contact with his banlieu family, and the result is the gradual, horribly hilarious, crumbling of the Catho family.

There are some wonderful scenes - like when the boy, now a preppy little darling in cardigan and glossy combed hair, drops in to the Arab shopkeeper who's the poor family's unofficial banker and backup; he mentions that the family are going to the country. "À Touquet. Ma grand-mère a une maison." He goes off, and the shopkeeper sits there in his tiny shop, smiling to himself and saying "À Touquet. Ma grand-mère a une maison." over again. Lots of "phrases cultes" from the film, including "C'est Lundi, c'est ravioli" - I won't spoiler it by revealing when and where this is said.

More: http://followatch.fr/posts/1190/la-vie-est-un-long-fleuve-tranquille-etienne-chatiliez-repliques-culte

A scene I'm particularly fond of is the happy-clappy priest singing "Jesus revient" with his congregation clapping along:

dr.fuzzenstein

Chuchote wrote: »

Bienvenue chez les ch'tis (in English, Welcome to the Sticks).

Apparently there's an Italian version that's also very funny.

First time I saw this I snorted tea straight out of my nose; sent it to a Belgian friend who fell off the couch he laughed so much!

That is begging for an Irish version with Liam Neeson and Pat Shortt.

Tom Mann Centuria

Micmacs, Delicatessen and the already mentioned Amelie. None are riotously funny but a lot of chuckles in all of them.

Chuchote

Then there are some that have great moments but don't really work overall. Agathe Clery, about a successful businesswoman, a total racist, who finds that her skin is turning black and her hair becoming kinky as a result of an illness. It doesn't work because the actress comes across as a white lady trying to act black, but there are some fabulous scenes - lots of singing and dancing, including a brilliant flamenco "coup de foudre" when Agathe meets and instantly falls in love with the love of her life.

exaisle

storker wrote: »

There's Gazon Maudit which I saw years ago and remember as pretty funny, in which a wife moves her lesbian lover in with her and her husband. It stars Josiane Balasko who also starred with Gerard Depardieu in Trop Belle Pour Toi which, while not side-splittingly funny, certain had a good few (darkly) funny moments.

La Cage aux Folles, the original French version of The Birdcage is also worth a look.

Great suggestion....It's also written and directed by Josiane Balasko and stars Victoria Abril (Tie me up, Tie me down....High Heels...etc)...which to be very specific, are Spanish comedies ;-)

Chuchote

exaisle wrote: »

Great suggestion....It's also written and directed by Josiane Balasko and stars Victoria Abril (Tie me up, Tie me down....High Heels...etc)...which to be very specific, are Spanish comedies ;-)

I just find La cage aux folles too sad, knowing all those beautiful men were harvested too young by the Aids epidemic.

Has anyone seen a TV series called Nicolas Le Floch? Heard good things about it. I tried reading one of the books but found it unreadable - awful, kludgy prose - but maybe the TV is better.

Mountainsandh

Chuchote wrote: »

I just find La cage aux folles too sad, knowing all those beautiful men were harvested too young by the Aids epidemic.

Has anyone seen a TV series called Nicolas Le Floch? Heard good things about it. I tried reading one of the books but found it unreadable - awful, kludgy prose - but maybe the TV is better.

Never heard about that.
But if TV series are in the run, Kaamelott definitely comes to mind. It seems most of it is on Youtube too !

https://youtu.be/6-ENx6OAkfs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-ENx6OAkfs

Victor

Les visiteurs http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108500/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_60

Mountainsandh

another very nice little comedy was called Le bonheur est dans le pré, not sure if it's available with subtitles, but Michel Serrault is in it.

shrapnel222

Mountainsandh wrote: »

another very nice little comedy was called Le bonheur est dans le pré, not sure if it's available with subtitles, but Michel Serrault is in it.

and eric cantona. great movie!!

Mountainsandh

Loved M Serrault. Not funny, but what was this film he did with Emmanuelle Beart ? Great film, Monsieur something ?

Mountainsandh

Damn you Chuchote I've had Jesus revient in my head all day. Myself and sister must have been around confirmation time when that came out, boy did we take the p/ss with this.

Chuchote

Mountainsandh wrote: »

Loved M Serrault. Not funny, but what was this film he did with Emmanuelle Heart ? Great film, Monsieur something ?

This?

I'm *just* on the edge of the point where I'll be able to hop along behind without French subtitles - maybe another 2 months till I get there.

Mountainsandh

Thanks that's it !
Stick with it so Chuchote, you'll have access to much more. I have to wait and get dvds with subtitles for work, but I'm French, and always disgusted at the delay/lack of choice. I'm repeating myself but put La chevre at the top of your list, I rewatched bits after this thread, and still find it as funny.

Myself and a bunch of youngsters are waiting for Les vacances du Petit Nicolas with subtitles for the past year and a half. :mad:
https://youtu.be/P0Ip4oRS4q0

La famille Bélier is a bit Hollywood-ey teenagey, but it's great, with some funny moments too. The mum and dad are gas. (that's available with subtitles)

Chuchote

Mountainsandh wrote: »

Thanks that's it !
Stick with it so Chuchote, you'll have access to much more. I have to wait and get dvds with subtitles for work, but I'm French, and always disgusted at the delay/lack of choice. I'm repeating myself but put La chevre at the top of your list, I rewatched bits after this thread, and still find it as funny.

Myself and a bunch of youngsters are waiting for Les vacances du Petit Nicolas with subtitles for the past year and a half. :mad:
https://youtu.be/P0Ip4oRS4q0

La famille Bélier is a bit Hollywood-ey teenagey, but it's great, with some funny moments too. The mum and dad are gas. (that's available with subtitles)

Most films have subtitles for the deaf, which are fine for me, allied with the Reverso online contextual dictionary (sometimes loopy but usually helpful). If a DVD doesn't have subtitles it can sometimes work if you rip it then hunt out an .srt file of the subtitles and add it; if it isn't in synch with the film, you can always open the .srt file in a text editor so you can stop the film and hop over to it if you hear a phrase you don't understand.

It's often possible to buy films after a year or two for a good price at amazon.fr, and basically pay a quid or so and then a fiver or so for postage. For instance, this new copy of Les Vacances de Petit Nicolas https://www.amazon.fr/Vacances-du-petit-Nicolas/dp/B00L9214XA/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1492639766&sr=1-1&keywords=petite+nicolas+en+vacances is a tenner or so, but there's a version "d'occasion" for 4.90 here https://www.amazon.fr/gp/offer-listing/B00L9214XA/ref=sr_1_1_olp?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1492639844&sr=1-1&keywords=petite+nicolas+en+vacances which would mean it would be a tenner or so altogether. It has "sous titres pour les sourds" in French.

Mountainsandh

Chuchote wrote: »

It has "sous titres pour les sourds" in French.

Oh I got caught a few times with that... You see I really really need English subtitles for the young people I'm showing them to, the French subtitles simply wouldn't be much good to 90% of them. Most of them are even reluctant when you mention subtitles, but generally if the film is good they forget their initial reluctance and really enjoy it.

Chuchote

Mountainsandh wrote: »

Oh I got caught a few times with that... You see I really really need English subtitles for the young people I'm showing them to, the French subtitles simply wouldn't be much good to 90% of them. Most of them are even reluctant when you mention subtitles, but generally if the film is good they forget their initial reluctance and really enjoy it.

Ah, that's a pity! Thought it was for yourself.