Bébés à gogo (1956)
Directed by Paul Mesnier

Film Review

The main thing to note about this cheeky little comedy is that it was one of the first in which France's supreme comedy legend Louis de Funès had a substantial role.  Over the previous decade, de Funès had cropped up in around ninety films, most often on screen for barely a few minutes, but in Bébés à gogo he gets one of his first fully fledged character roles, and he is hilarious as a company representative actively fuelling France's baby boom of the 1950s.  Even though he proves to be the star of the film, de Funès had to content himself with third billing, after Jane Sourza and Raymond Souplex, another notable pair of comedy performers made famous by their popular radio series Sur le banc and its subsequent film adaptation.  The film is directed by Paul Mesnier, whose previous work includes the Belle Époque drama La Kermesse rouge (1947).

Immediately after appearing in this film, Souplex was offered his most celebrated role, as Inspector Bourrel in the popular long running French television crime series, Les Cinq Dernières Minutes, so he is far better known today as a dramatic actor.  One of the delights of Bébés à gogo is that it reveals Souplex's other side, his well-developed penchant for comedy.  In his first scene with de Funès he is turned out as Louis XIV, probably the most effective way he could devise to prevent his comedy rival from totally stealing the focus from him.  The other popular comedy performer who features in the film, Jean Carmet, scarcely gets a look-in.  Apart from a few dreadful musical numbers and its ever so slightly disturbing premise (manufacturing babies for profit), Bébés à gogo is a comedy delight that makes an effective satire on the idiotic incentives to encourage 'familles nombreuses' in post-war France.

Film Synopsis

Stéphane Petitbourgeois, an accountant at a large department store, shares his modest apartment with his wife Isabelle, daughter Pat, son-in-law Hubert, and the latters' brood of nine children.  One day, Stéphane is visited by a publicity executive for a firm of baby products, Célestin Ratier, and is told that he stands to win a generous prize if he acquires three more grandchildren before his fiftieth birthday.  Instead of berating his daughter and son-in-law on their fertility, as he has been for the past ten years, Stéphane encourages them to go on churning out babies, confident that he will win his prize of a dream house in the country within three years.  Unfortunately, Hubert's capacity for making babies suddenly appears to have deserted him...