Les Amateurs (2003)
Directed by Martin Valente

Film Review

Les Amateurs - “The Likely Lads” French-style - is director Martin Valente's first full-length film, an adaptation of his earlier short film, Ta Soeur (2001).  Despite Valente's attempt to cram far too much into one film (a common failing amongst film directors when making the transition from shorts to features), this makes enjoyable viewing and delivers more than a few genuinely funny moments.  Jalil Lespert and Lorànt Deutsch star as the film's central characters, two equally hopeless seducers of the opposite sex who make a loveable and highly effective double act.  Interestingly, this is Lespert's first comic role and the actor carries it off admirably, proving that, having established himself as a straight actor of no mean calibre, he also has a talent for comedy.

Film Synopsis

J.P. and Christophe are two ordinary lads, in their mid-twenties, who come from an ordinary low-incoming housing estate in France.  Both have a positive attitude towards life and seem not to mind the fact that they have no money and no prospects.  J.P. earns a meagre crust as a shelf-stacker in a supermarket, whilst Christophe scrapes by with any odd job coming his way.  Their friendship enters a tricky phase when J.P. starts taking an interest in his friend's cousin Maya, and Christophe falls head over heels in love with J.P.'s sister Malika.  Both lads are keen to attract the interest of their respective objects of desire, but are singularly ill-equipped to do so.  In the attempt, they manage to get themselves mixed up in a bank robbery, for which they are the sole witnesses.  Things take an even more bizarre turn when J.P. starts to be treated very strangely by his boss, who is certain that he has found his missing son...