Grégoire Ludig (Manu in this film) and David Marsais (Jean-Gab here) are actors well known to a French-language viewer, but not to an Anglophone one, so a certain part of the humour will be lost: the duo are especially known for the Palmashow, of which the first television programme was La Folle Histoire du Palmashow (2010), and then the first feature film was Jonathan Barré's La Folle Histoire de Max et Léon (2016). Then came Mandibules.
This is, of course, an absurd film, but much funnier than Dupieux (aka musician Mr. Oizo) has come up with before. Manu and Jean-Gab are petty, thirtysomething crooks down on their luck, Manu out of work and sleeping on the beach, Jean-Gab still living with his mother. They've known each other for a long time, as witnessed by their constant 'Check taureau' signs, which mean everything and nothing. Manu has stolen a wreck of a car which he needs in order to deliver a small suitcase to the unknown Michel Michel, for which he'll receive five hundred euros, which is no doubt a large amount for a down and out. For some unknown reason – and here, perhaps, we're reminded of the frequent 'no reason' of Rubber – Jean-Gab is co-opted into the business.
They only have a half-hour drive to complete the mission, but a fly gets in the way, and not just any fly. This is a giant fly hollering in the boot of the stolen car, but (these guys are not on their uppers for nothing) Jean-Gab hits on an idea of brilliance: they can make much more than a measly five hundred balles, they can make a thousand times more by training the fly to be a drone, rob banks while they just do nothing: putain !
There are digressions, including very briefly living in a caravan which Manu by accident sets fire to, but they run out of petrol and Cécile (India Hair) mistakes Manu for a guy she knew in the past, and hey they have a place to stay in relative luxury. The trouble is not so much that brother Serge (Roméo Elvis) thinks they're a couple of débiles (brainless low-lifes in this case), but that they disturb Agnès (Adèle Exarchopoulos).
Agnès herself is disturbed, and as a result of a skiing accident can only scream instead of talk normally, but she also seems stricken heavily by paranoia. And although the buddies pass off this paranoia with impunity, they can't get away with it all the time, and after being rumbled by accident they hit the road (after syphoning some necessary gas).
So what can a fly do after being set free from the masking tape that holds down her wings: fly away, of course, and the buddies are about to happily re-begin their lives as losers, when she appears on the bonnet with the requested bunch of bananas. That's one very successfully trained fly. So what's next?
Yeah, I loved this.
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