La Première Étoile

People with minds full of received ideas have often limited ideas. "Black people can't ski" "skiing,it's the white's business" Writer/actor /director Lucien Jean -Baptiste based his movie on it: Winter sports are almost unthinkable for an unemployed black lazy dreamer and his family;cut to the quick,the father takes up the challenge :he will go out of his way to take his family to a ski resort.

On the minus side: it's full of clichés ,too much -racists-are-everywhere style (check the scene in the café ),and the last third of the movie succumbs to the usual vices :finer feelings,bland love affair with a bourgeois girl from the posh districts,return of the mother ,and "La Première Etoile" ("the first star" is a ski level ).

On the plus side: Bernadette Lafont is sensational as the chalet landlady ,in a part close to that she plays in "Paulette".She first appears as a tight-fisted racist shrew when she "welcomes" her guests :"We were not told you were (she's about to say "black") .....five""those people are not like us " .And ,little by little ,she becomes friends with the grandma (Firmine Richard has plenty of go).Madame Mergeot is not really good at geography ,but she discovers these people who" are not like her " ,and ,abetted by her kind-hearted husband (played by pop singer Michel Jonasz),she makes a deal with grandma ...Like Paulette in the aforementioned movie,gone is her racism ,gone are her generally accepted ideas.This subplot is close to what Jean-Baptiste aimed for .

I have got this DVD for rental from a friend cause it should be very funny. In fact I had a good entertaining time with my family. We laughed tears. The story is built up very simply and had many joking lines. It shows a family with social and financial problems. All the children and actors inclusive the director staff in the movie did a great job. The running time was with eighty minutes just fine. The filming locations in the mountains were well chosen and nice.

I find the rating is too underrated here. Perhaps there were too many dialogs about black and white questions. Anyway, give it a chance and you won't regret. 8/10.