«Papi Sitter»: comedy must take us seriously

Cinema Wednesdays - Loris S. Musumeci

Seventeen-year-old Camille has her A-levels in two months. But that's far from her main concern. She's thinking about saving the planet, having fun and boys. Her parents are well aware of this. So they have to help her prepare for her exams and keep a close eye on her. But they have no choice but to go away. After a year of unemployment, they are offered a good job on a cruise ship. So they call up Grandpa André to look after the little one. A psychorigid retired police captain, he arrives with his own plans, rules and discipline. But the other Grandpa Camille also arrives: Teddy, a party boy, biker and rocker. These very different papis have to live together, much to Camille's despair.

Why not? Philippe Guillard, true to his filmography, offers us a very classic but well thought-out comedy. It's a comedy of confrontation. The obvious confrontation between the two grandfathers, who agree on nothing but will do anything for their granddaughter. A generational clash between Camille, with her «check», «de ouf», «grave», «québlo» and so on, and her grandfathers, who have at least one thing in common: they don't identify at all with the values of the younger generation.

The construction is pertinent, but the fact remains that the film doesn't really work. The comedy is only partially successful in its primary objective of making people laugh, and the film as a whole is not worth much. This is not the fault of the genre. Comedy can produce masterpieces, even if it's true that it's often automatically regarded as second-rate cinema. Rightly so, because comedy films are often reduced to laugh-out-loud entertainment, with little regard for the photography or the images on screen. And wrongly, because comedy can be so successful that it becomes a cult, a common reference point - just think of one or two lines from Bronzed -Or it can engage in a clever scenario that says a lot more than the laughs it elicits.

I believe that for a comedy to be successful, the director first and the actors second must take their audience seriously. Yes, take them seriously! Something Philippe Guillard didn't do, botching his script with caricatures, bad jokes and trivia. It's a pity, because by not valuing his audience, he didn't value himself. Come on, let's get a couple of platitudes out of the way, get it over with, people are unhappy anyway, so even a lousy comedy will do. No, Philippe, it doesn't. A little height. A little requirement. Comedy and public laughter deserve better. Louis de Funès won't be back, Les Bronzés may not, but let's not forget that French comedy has a noble tradition, and that it must be honored by finer, more honest comedies, which I hope will soon be on our screens.

Write to the author: loris.musumeci@leregardlibre.com

Photo credit: © JMH Distributions