André le magnifique (2000) - film review

A couple who live in a rural backwater of France decide to put on a play to celebrate the history of their town.  Alexis will write and direct the play, and his wife Janine will take the lead female role.  Their temperamental friend Norbert will take care of set design and lighting.  To play the part of the male lead, the amateur troupe hires a professional actor, Monsieur Faix, from Paris, and the retarded odd-job man André will serve as stage-hand and prompter.  As soon as the rehearsals begins, things start to go horribly wrong.  Faix finds the amateurishness of the proceedings bearly tolerable and soon manages to alienate himself from the entire cast and crew.  Then, in a fit of pique, the usually docile André manages to dispose of the loathsome lead actor.  To his alarm, André suddenly finds himself having to take Faix’s part in the play...

André le magnifique is a bucolic comic romp which takes some unashamedly cruel gibes at country life and amateur dramatics.  A careless mix of black comedy and farce, with some odd surrealist touches, the film is brought to life by its set of extraordinarily grotesque characters.  Most memorable are a bombastic professional actor (whose better qualities include his flatulence and frankness about other people’s hygiene problems) and a retarded middle-aged man with the mind of a temperamental child and the heart of a tortured poet.

What faults the film has – for example, in its plotting and dialogue – are easily masked by its constant ability to surprise and entertain.   This may not have been the most polished or artistically accomplished of French films to have been released in the year 2000, but it is certainly one of the most funny and original.

The film was closely based on a very popular stage play, written by a theatrical troupe which included Denis Polyadès.  That play proved to be a major hit in France, winning five Molière Awards in 1998.  Most of the team involved in the stage play appear in the film version, which many critics have commented is somewhat less inspired than the original play.

© James Travers 2003

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