Warning : spoiler
Fact : this film has puzzled the critics, the international audience as well as the intellectual Parisian establishment with its phenomenal success (I mean, with the French public)...Why, but oh why, has this unpretentious, rather funny comedy, OK, been such a blockbuster?
Mystery revealed :
The French, who are sourpusses, egoistical, cold hearted, hypocritical people (I am one!), KNOW, all of them, that a gem of a people lives way, way up in the gloomy, rainy, barren north of the country : the Ch'tis. Up there, dire life conditions and the common destiny of working generation after generation in the coal mines (now closed) and textile mills (now also closed) gave way to the most humane, the kindest-hearted, the most equal of the French, and maybe of the Europeans.
All the French know at least the two first verses of this Enrico Macias -a North African Jew!- song : "People of the North have in the eyes the blue that their setting is lacking, people of the North have in their heart the sun that they don't have outside"
I've personally known a Ch'ti family who used to leave their door open all day in the worst suburb of Paris ; one of my wife's acquaintances told her how, when she was a kid, she and her friends, roaming the streets of their mining city, would simply enter any home, at random, through its already opened door, and just had to say "we're hungry" or "we're thirsty" to be regaled with waffles and apple juice, all of them, always (and remember that these people were the poorest)...Dany Boon himself describes how, as she moved to the North, one of his friends stopped passers-by who were picking her furniture up from inside the truck, in fear that they were stealing her belongings, when in fact they were spontaneously helping her...She just couldn't fathom that!
Oh yes, the Normands are cool, the Bretons are serious, the Alsacians are hard-working, the Southwesterners are tough, the Provençals are jolly, the Auvergnats are thrifty, and the Corsicans...Well, forget it. OK, OK...But the heart of gold belongs to the Ch'tis, although they live in the worst environment, the worst climate, the worst unemployment, everybody knows that in France, and this film lifts part of the shroud around this enduring mystery, hence its phenomenal success.
There! Fascination explained!
Now about the story : a small-ranking Manager from the French Postal Service, married to a disenchanted but beautiful wife and living in Provence, though not yet on the Riviera, understanding that only disabled employees can have a chance to move out there, tries to con his way by faking disability, gets caught (hilarious scene), and is sent, as a disciplinary measure, where nobody in France wants to go, the gloomy, desperate North...What region? Simply that : the North, it's the region name, a program in itself (Michel Galabru, hilarious as a Provençal who lived the northern freezing hell for a while in his childhood, simply states "ThaaaAAAt's the NoooooOOrr!") ; for fear of aggravating his wive's depression, he goes alone with the promise to return home on every week-end.
At first, everything fits in his gloomy scenario : gloomy climate, gloomy urban landscapes, incomprehensible people speaking a bastardized dialect, smelly cheese dipped in the (YUCK!) morning coffee (in fact curled endive decoction, one other northern specialty)...But little by little, he is tipped over by the kindness of the people ; only, this is a double-edged sword, for the more his wife believes he is living in hell, the more affectionate and amorous she gets...Finally, our hero is living the best of both worlds, happy at work and happy at home, by lying blatantly about his everyday life...Alas, alas, his wife, realizing how egoistical she's been until then, decides to join him in exile...And then...Ah, better let you see the film!
Overall : a very good film, sometimes emotional, sometimes funny, sometimes really hilarious.
Fact : this film has puzzled the critics, the international audience as well as the intellectual Parisian establishment with its phenomenal success (I mean, with the French public)...Why, but oh why, has this unpretentious, rather funny comedy, OK, been such a blockbuster?
Mystery revealed :
The French, who are sourpusses, egoistical, cold hearted, hypocritical people (I am one!), KNOW, all of them, that a gem of a people lives way, way up in the gloomy, rainy, barren north of the country : the Ch'tis. Up there, dire life conditions and the common destiny of working generation after generation in the coal mines (now closed) and textile mills (now also closed) gave way to the most humane, the kindest-hearted, the most equal of the French, and maybe of the Europeans.
All the French know at least the two first verses of this Enrico Macias -a North African Jew!- song : "People of the North have in the eyes the blue that their setting is lacking, people of the North have in their heart the sun that they don't have outside"
I've personally known a Ch'ti family who used to leave their door open all day in the worst suburb of Paris ; one of my wife's acquaintances told her how, when she was a kid, she and her friends, roaming the streets of their mining city, would simply enter any home, at random, through its already opened door, and just had to say "we're hungry" or "we're thirsty" to be regaled with waffles and apple juice, all of them, always (and remember that these people were the poorest)...Dany Boon himself describes how, as she moved to the North, one of his friends stopped passers-by who were picking her furniture up from inside the truck, in fear that they were stealing her belongings, when in fact they were spontaneously helping her...She just couldn't fathom that!
Oh yes, the Normands are cool, the Bretons are serious, the Alsacians are hard-working, the Southwesterners are tough, the Provençals are jolly, the Auvergnats are thrifty, and the Corsicans...Well, forget it. OK, OK...But the heart of gold belongs to the Ch'tis, although they live in the worst environment, the worst climate, the worst unemployment, everybody knows that in France, and this film lifts part of the shroud around this enduring mystery, hence its phenomenal success.
There! Fascination explained!
Now about the story : a small-ranking Manager from the French Postal Service, married to a disenchanted but beautiful wife and living in Provence, though not yet on the Riviera, understanding that only disabled employees can have a chance to move out there, tries to con his way by faking disability, gets caught (hilarious scene), and is sent, as a disciplinary measure, where nobody in France wants to go, the gloomy, desperate North...What region? Simply that : the North, it's the region name, a program in itself (Michel Galabru, hilarious as a Provençal who lived the northern freezing hell for a while in his childhood, simply states "ThaaaAAAt's the NoooooOOrr!") ; for fear of aggravating his wive's depression, he goes alone with the promise to return home on every week-end.
At first, everything fits in his gloomy scenario : gloomy climate, gloomy urban landscapes, incomprehensible people speaking a bastardized dialect, smelly cheese dipped in the (YUCK!) morning coffee (in fact curled endive decoction, one other northern specialty)...But little by little, he is tipped over by the kindness of the people ; only, this is a double-edged sword, for the more his wife believes he is living in hell, the more affectionate and amorous she gets...Finally, our hero is living the best of both worlds, happy at work and happy at home, by lying blatantly about his everyday life...Alas, alas, his wife, realizing how egoistical she's been until then, decides to join him in exile...And then...Ah, better let you see the film!
Overall : a very good film, sometimes emotional, sometimes funny, sometimes really hilarious.