French Film Night
Tuesday, September 15, 2009, 07:00 PM
Eddy Room 212

The Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures is pleased to present French Film Night on Tuesday, Sept. 15 at 7 p .m. in Eddy Room 212. The film is free and open to the public.

Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis ("Welcome to the Sticks") is in color in French with subtitles in English. This 2007 film is 1 hr. and 46 minutes in length.

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Film summary

Called Bienvenue chez les ch'tis in France (where it has grossed $116m after a mere three weeks) this very personal Dany Boon project is about a prejudiced post office manager from Southern France who is forced to live amongst the Ch'tis, residents of the Nord-Pas de Calais region of France, who speak "cheutimi." The whole idea of cheutimi seems hysterically funny to your average French person, but may sink like a boule for non-native speakers.

Sticks is a fish-out-of-water farce that could be remade in every country in which a certain region is mocked for being backward. Co-written, directed by and starring Nord-Pas de Calais native Dany Boon (whose over-the-top clowning in a major role really won't help the picture in international markets), Sticks benefits greatly from the warm presence of Kad Merad as Salon-de-Provence post office manager Philippe.

Philippe tries to cheat his way into a Cote D'Azur transfer at the urging of his depressed wife Julie (Zoe Felix), but is found out, and sent to the northern town of Bergues instead. Packing his Southern prejudices along with some artic clothing, Philippe hits the road, leaving his wife and son behind.

Julie, meanwhile, is oddly cheered up by his hardship posting and relishes her new role of consoling wife. Of course, once in Bergues, Philippe finds the town, its residents and his co-workers (led by Boon as lovelorn drunken postie Antoine) quite charming, and soon he's having a great time with his new buddies.

The film's gags are professionally-executed throughout and Sticks's best sequence - a bravura, genuinely funny extended set-up carried out with aplomb - comes when Julie heads north and the locals try live up to their reputation as drunken yokels to put her off.

This may come too late in the game for some, however, and Boon fails to quit while the going's good, instead indulging in a banal corny finale. Apart from Boon's mugging, the acting credits are uniformly charming, led by Merad, Zoe Felix as his love interest and Philippe Marivin and Guy Lecluyse in supporting roles as post office workers. Technical credits are fine and, as mentioned above, the sub-titlers have made heroic efforts, at least in the English version.

[Summary by Fionnuala Halligan, ScreenDaily.com]

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Event Contact: Lynne Barnes can be reached at (970) 491-5355

Sponsored by the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures.