C'EST PAS MOI... C'EST L'AUTRE
What the Critics Say
Le Soleil
24 December 2004
** 2 stars
Mistaken Identity
Pretentiously billed as “the comedy of the holiday season”, a worn-out marketing trick which no longer fools anyone, C’est pas moi … c’est l’autre is neither a great comedy nor is it a cause for celebration.
Three ingredients prevent it from descending into the ‘pointless’ category of films. Roy Dupuis, Lucie Laurier and a screenplay with some amusing contrivances around a case of mistaken identity: a common thief is taken for his double, a police officer, a situation that the crook decides to exploit.
Rarely called upon to play comedy, Dupuis proves to be the best newcomer of Alain Zaloum’s film. After shining as always in the drama Mémoires affectives, his performance in C’est pas moi … c’est l’autre emphasises his capability, his talents. Talents which do not incline him towards burlesque, but in a film where there are situations that could be played as farce, instead of doing an acting number on them, Dupuis convincingly lets you see through the story, especially when he plays the clumsy guy who has to learn to become a cop.
At the centre of the mix-up is Lucie Laurier, the partner of the reputedly macho cop, who discovers a completely different man in the one who has taken his identity. Highly praised in La Grande Séduction, Laurier is the plot’s love interest, the girl who is fooled like everybody else by the crook/cop, completely falling for him with her defences down. A supporting role which she nevertheless enhances (when will she be given a really good character?)
C’est pas moi … c’est l’autre is not a film with pretensions to greatness. Don’t look for anything more satisfying than a light snack. All the same it’s a bit of a mess. This reflects the constraints of co-production. Co-funded by France and England, the film really tries to justify the presence onscreen of some French actors. It succeeds in the case of the plot (the Marseillaise mafia is hot on the heels of the thief turned cop) but the result onscreen borders on a playing to the gallery of the worst order.
When Anémone and Michel Muller make an appearance, it’s as if a different film has been superimposed on the first one. The acting is so exaggerated, such a caricature, far from the style of the Quebecois actors (with the exception of Benoît Brière and Caroline Néron who overdo it), both Anémone and Muller transforming each of their appearances into a bad comedy routine, even on the subject of language. <<differences between the French and Quebecois dialects - viv >>
La Presse
24 December 2004
** 2 stars
When do we laugh?
While the words “moi” and “l’autre” appear in Alain Zaloum’s C’est pas moi … c’est l’autre, don’t go looking for Denise Filiatrault’s “when’s the punchline?”
<< Explanation: as far as I can make out, comedienne Denise Filiatrault has a show called Moi et l’autre and a catchphrase of “when’s the punchline?”– viv >>
Not very funny, this situation comedy features a cast which, on paper, is top class : Roy Dupuis, Anémone, Lucie Laurier, Luck Mervil, Michel Muller …
First in the ranks of the guilty are Luis Furtado’s screenplay and dialogue which, however, sit a lot further down the class. “I’m only a petty thief trying to make an honest living!”; that took some thought, eh? Then there’s Alain Zaloum’s contribution; the director conducts his actors with a trowel rather than a baton, with the result that they lay it on thick rather than going for subtlety.
[ << The review continues to be distinctly uncomplimentary to Anémone, Luck Mervil and Michel Muller, similar to the one above.>>]
Three exceptions to this orchestra of false notes; Lucie Laurier, Roy Dupuis and … Roy Dupuis. [ …] In short, only these two are convincing. And it would have been even easier to believe their story if the rest of the cast had been better directed and hadn’t notched up so many clichés. […]
Alain Zaloum said that C’est pas moi … c’est l’autre has been made with a shortage of money and therefore a shortage of time. The problem in fact might be found in another shortage – a good screenplay. It’s not a minor detail.