La Grande Vadrouille

This film has the remarkable property that there aren't any boring pieces in it. It just brings you more than 2 hours of top-comedy, together with a fine scenario. The magical trio Louis de Funès, Bourvil and Gérard Oury make this film so unique. If you like this one, be sure to have seen Le Corniaud.

This was a hilarious movie, I'd imagine even for people who don't speak French. Louis de Funes was great, and the whole movies if definitely one I'm going to see again, just for the sheer fun of it! Bottom line: hilarious, 8/10

The setting: a British bomber is shot down (due to some navigational errors) above Paris. The crew get separated, and each of them needs the help of a few French people to escape from the occupied city, and eventually to England. Of course, evil Germans persecute them throughout the movie...

All of this is a backdrop to a wonderful comedy. It could be compared with Mel Brooks' "To be or not to be", and I believe it comes out the superior of the two. Easily the best Louis de Funes movie ever - and so, perhaps, also the best French comedy ever...

Why is this movie so funny? And why is it universally judged to be so by people who don't understand French culture? I have asked myself this question while watching it for the Nth time and while asking myself why most Hollywood 'comedies' made today are not funny at all. I believe that the answer is that the basis of all comedy is to make fun of someone. Here, fun is made of sexual stereotypes, of the British, of the French and, most of all, of the Germans, Nazis in this case. Hollywood has become so politically-correct that it now only dares make fun of a WASP male in a business suit, and of no one else. Take the case of 'The Birdcage', a remake of the French comedy 'La cage aux folles' made some 20 years earlier. Being bilingual, I can testify that the original version is immensely more funny than the Hollywood remake. That is because the Hollywood bean-counters, who like to pass themselves off as artistic decision-makers, toned down most of the fun that had been made of homosexuals in the original movie. Ask Shakespeare or Moliere: the play or movie will be funny only if it pokes cruel fun at someone, provided it is not at you. Sorry for the politically-incorrect opinion.

Released in Australia as DON'T LOOK NOW...WE'RE BEING SHOT AT this dubbed French WW2 farce was a runaway hit and most unexpectedly so during winter 1968. Usually French films just are subtitled here but, like Das Boot later, it is one of the few expertly dubbed...maybe there was an English version made given some of the cast. Anyway, it was plonked into one city theater as a filler when some other film fell over...and became a record breaking ticket seller for about 3 months. I can remember (it well) the audience screaming with laughter in the huge 1200 seat Lyceum Theatre...especially during one particular chase scene. The Lyceum was the showcase for most family films like THOROUGHLY MODERN MILLIE and later WHATS UP DOC so maybe there was an inbuilt audience for Lyceum style shows that helped this film find box office gold immediately. However, after its initial run, it never surfaced again and has never been seen on TV video or DVD in Australia. Just one colossal release and oblivion!