La Doublure (2006) - film review

Wealthy businessman Pierre Levasseur faces a potentially ruinous divorce when a magazine publishes a photograph of him having a tryst with his mistress, the supermodel Elena Simonsen.  His lawyer Foix comes to his rescue, suggesting that he pays off another man in the photograph to pose as Elena’s boyfriend for the next few weeks.  The man in question is François Pignon, an unassuming valet who works for an exclusive restaurant.  He accepts Levasseur’s proposal, intending to give the money he is offered to his girlfriend Émilie to save her bookshop from going bust.  The only person who is unhappy with the arrangement is François’s flatmate, Richard, who has to go back to living with his alcoholic mother.   Having signed a contract with Foix that guarantees her twenty million euros if Levasseur fails to leave his wife for her in the near future, Elena moves in with François.  At first, the stratagem seems to work, but Levasseur’s wife is no fool and soon discovers she is being duped...

Francis Veber’s film comedies have a broad and enduring appeal, and some, such as La Chèvre (1981) and Le Dîner de cons (1998) have become classics of French cinema.   La Doublure may not be the director’s best comedy offering to date but it has many of the ingredients of an enjoyable Veber farce, notably the quick-fire wordplay and abundance of absurd comic situations.  Admittedly, the jokes are not as fresh or piquant as in previous Veber comedies, but a top notch cast helps to compensate for this, even if most of the parts are blatant caricatures who have as much charm and depth as a sheet of very thin card or a reality TV contestant.   Daniel Auteuil and Richard Berry just about steal the show with their bizarre double act, which has a horribly familiar Tony Blair / Alastair Cambell resonance to it, alas without the hilarious WMD wheeze which had us all rolling in the aisles in 2002.

Gad Elmaleh is the latest fearless thespian to assume the mantle of Veber’s likable comic hero François Pignon, who, like James Bond and Dr Who, has a peculiar habit of changing his face and his personality every year or so, suggesting he is either an agent in the employ of British Intelligence, or a Time Lord who happens to like France a lot.  The accident-prone Pignon was originally played (to perfection) by Jacques Brel in the 1973 film L’Emmerdeur (scripted by Veber), and was then subsequently portrayed by such stars as Pierre Richard, Jacques Villeret and Daniel Auteuil.  So far, no explanation for the frequent face changing has been given, although tax avoidance is clearly a possibility.  

François Pignon is not to be confused with another recurring Veber hero, François Perrin, who has been played by Pierre Richard, Patrick Dewaere and Patrick Bruel.  There has been some speculation that the two characters – Pignon and Perrin – are the same man, a notion that is substantiated by the fact that Pierre Richard has played both roles.  Of course, on that logic, Hamlet and Othello would be the same man, because they were both played by Laurence Olivier.  Hopefully, Francis Veber will one day resolve the matter by putting Perrin and Pignon together in the same film – and wouldn’t it be fun if they turned out to be a pair of shape-changing aliens...?

© James Travers 2008

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