If you have never seen this French movie, you frankly don't miss anything. There are at least five major shortcomings to enable you to skip "tout doit disparaître" without any regret.
- First of all, it is obvious that when you shot a movie with very restricted means (the scenery and certain parts of dialogs seem extracted from a sitcom. Moreover, there are only five important actors plus a handful of extras), the result can't be convincing.
- Then, the actors are really bad, especially Yolande Moreau. But the prize of the worst actress arguably goes to the non-existent, the inexpressive, the colorless Ophélie Winter. Why on earth did she have to get involved in that business?
- The making is far from making up for the whole: it is flat, it lacks of liveliness and Philippe Muyl, the director neglected two significant details that would probably have contributed to the success of this comedy: the grain of madness and the logic of absurd humor.
- So, if the director had used the two quoted details, the script in its general line could have given birth to a relevant black comedy. But it is not the case. There are too many predictable sudden new developments and the scriptwriters go from one idea to another without any logical liking and with a certain clumsiness.
- At last, the movie doesn't work because it uses stereotyped characters: Yolande Moreau is perhaps rich but she is ugly. As for Ophélie Winter, Didier Bourdon's secretary, the authors introduce her as a ravishing character.
In the end? There's nothing left but a flop. A British filmmaker like Charles Crichton would have been the perfect man for the job. Besides, the very end of the movie (when all the characters are on the plane) is an allusion to "A Fish Called Wanda" (1988).
