Raoul André was an unambitious director whose early works (this one, "Fiacre 17") are more successful than later productions which are among the most hopeless French farces of the sixties and seventies.
First of April : April fools galore in the studios where a radio broadcast takes place ;the MC pretends to shoot dead all the artists .Eventually ,up comes the "letters to the editor " man :this time , the poor guy is shot dead for good.The radio host is abducted ,and while he is in captivity ,he still believes he is the victim of a long "April fool"!This trick of the "April fools" is relatively well applied in the first fifteen minutes,although it consists mainly of singers and even a ventriloquist (but we won't see him perform)for it is a radio show at a time TV sets were almost unknown in France.The programme is sponsored by the "Tour Du Pin " pill, the pill which is supposed" to make you one year younger every morning ".
After the man responsible for "letters to the editor" is murdered ,the radio show turns into a detective story ,but it is neither a good thriller (unless the scene of the hanged man counts) nor a very funny comedy (the heroine screams when she sees a tiny mouse ,not the murdered man.)
Meanwhile , as the captain is an incompetent,three of the artists decide to investigate :Louise shows flair and insight.Most of the time, it is a heavy-handed farce ,devoid of black humor,which is a problem ,for there are three crimes in all.It involves a gang of arms dealers,who pass on their messages in the "letters to the editors' column ;their head ,whose identity is revealed in the last minutes ,is unexpected, to put it mildly.
The cast includes Francis Blanche,a famous stand up comic ,Louise Carletti ,who would be the director's favorite actress from his first effort ("Le Village De La Colère") to the early sixties ("La planque" her last role),Pierre Cour :all are cast as themselves .However,it's veteran Marguerite Moreno who steals the show in her last part (she was to die shortly afterwards) of "Mémée radio" ,who cooks donuts every Sunday.
