La Chèvre

Although the video box described the pairing in this movie as reminiscent of Laurel and Hardy, I think this is greatly overstating things. However, it is still a very good movie and worth your time.

The story concerns the abduction of a VERY unlucky girl and the investigation into her disappearance. Gérard Depardieu is a competent kick-butt detective that is unable to find her after searching 42 days. Then a psychologist suggests to her rich father that they are going about searching in the wrong way--to find such an unlucky girl they should use a man equally as unlucky as they are bound to be drawn to each other! Silly as it may seem, this strategy seems to have something going for it, but Depardieu feels quite miffed that this boob, Pierre Richard, keeps blindly stumbling into important clues.

While this is not the funniest movie, it certainly does offer quite a few laughs. When I find myself laughing out loud, I know it must be a pretty good comedy!

FYI--I probably SHOULD take off another point from the score, as the movie had two stupid moments: in the jungle in Mexico, our heroes encounter a gorilla AND a cobra--this isn't even the right continent for either!!

These two actors are great together, and their three films are all funny (La Chevre, Les Comperes, Les Fugitifs), but this one is the best because of its concept that it will take an unlucky detective to find the missing unlucky girl. But he is more than unlucky; he is also a deluded jerk (though not a mean one)who doesn't even know he is unlucky. His partner, a very competent realist (and perfect straight man) has to rescue him time after time to follow his unlucky course toward the girl. Great French humor.

A hilarious comedy, and justifiably a box-office smash in France, this is a must-see for fans of the two stars. Richard and Depardieu are at their best while their characters experience mishap after mishap in trying to find a businessman's daughter. Remade a decade later as "Pure Luck", this film stands as further proof that the original usually outshines the remake. Rent this film if you like to laugh.

This was only Veber's second film as a double-threat (writer-director) and the first to employ the inspired casting of Gerard Depardieu and Pierre Richard. Its recent re-release on DVD to celebrate its 20th anniversary should make it accessible to a whole new generation too young to have caught it first time around. One only has to read the comments - almost exclusively raves - to guage the quality and I can only add one more voice, slightly hoarse from so much laughter in support. The concept is simplicity itself; take one accident-prone girl and because her father is an industrialist, ergo wealthy, let her predilection for bad luck result in her playing into the hands of kidnappers THEN, instead of hiring a team of SAS/mercenaries to track her down hire just One private investigator and supply him with a human bloodhound in the form of as big a dork as the missing girl. Pierre Richard breathes life into a dork who doesn't wait for a banana skin to trip on, he brings his own. Team him up with a pragmatic Gerard Depardieu who refuses to give house room to the concept of bad luck and just stand back and let them get on with it. The Mexican setting is largely irrelevant, it could just as well have been set in Marseilles but laffs are laffs wherever they occur. The ending is particularly effective - it's always something of a problem to end a story like this - as the two Dorks fall in love as expected but then Veber rounds it off with one last neat and very apposite visual gag. Not to be missed. 10/10

The film seems to me to be the best comedy ever. Both Richard and Depardieu are wonderful. The film abounds in comic situations, but the dialogue is even better - lively, volatile, "French". It is both a comedy of situations and a comedy of words. This film is like a Mont Blanc among comedies. It's a pity that few people bother to vote for it. In Russia a generation grew up laughing at the characters of Richard, and this generation was far from being the worst. His films are pure joy.