What is remarkable about "Les Intouchables" is that it is so un-French: no ideology, no intellectualism, no class warfare or morose soliloquy about the human condition. The story is based on a real-life experience, and not a funny one at that: A rich aristocrat, who had lost his wife to cancer, becomes quadriplegic after a paragliding accident and needs round-the-clock care to try and survive. Against all odds and his family's advice, he hires Driss, a huge Senegalese-born young hoodlum from the "banlieue" just out of prison for petty crime, with no experience but a quick wit and an irresistible laugh. Driss becomes his boss's lifeline, his ally, his friend, the only one able to make him feel like wanting to live again. There is no pathos in the movie, and none of the stereotypes to be expected from such a scenario. The poor do not blame the rich for their condition, the aristocrat in his elegant mansion is not held responsible for the crowded slums and the drug trafficking in the suburbs. When Driss drives his boss's car to watch the woman who raised him clean the windows of a hospital to earn her modest living, he doesn't smash the Maserati just to make a protest. Well-written and wonderfully played by Omar Sy and François Cluzet, the film relies on simple, good-humored cultural gaps: The scene where Driss has to take Philippe to the opera and sit through four hours of Wagner is hilarious.
Why has such a feel-good movie, with no political underlining nor any hint of social criticism, become such a hit in a country where indignation is a national pastime and gloom the customary mood? That is precisely where the answer may lie. The French are the most depressed of all nations, according to a recent Gallup poll conducted in 53 countries. They fear for the future, reel under the current financial turmoil, resent the weakening of the protective state, dread globalization and dislike this tormented century in which France seems not quite sure where to stand. Such characters as the two "Intouchables" behaving like good, well-meaning, unprejudiced, generous people, trespassing the normal codes of French social behavior, help erase the aggressiveness and racial tensions of everyday life. A story with a happy ending, in these times of political squabbling and economic uncertainty, is a welcome surprise, a breath of fresh air compared to the many decent, but depressing movies about unemployment, relocation and overspending currently being shown in French movie theaters.
Variety, the American trade magazine, published an acid review of "Les Intouchables" on its Web site. It found the movie to be as crude and racist as "Uncle Tom's Cabin," predicting that the Weinstein company, which bought the rights for a remake, would find it impossible to sell to an American audience. A few Paris critics, uneasy as usual with popular success, have described the film as populist, if not overtly rightist. Others see it as a "bo-bo" movie — the kind of sentimental utopia cultivated on the fringes of the left. One pundit went so far as to try analyzing its impact as a way of predicting the outcome of the French presidential election.
What remains to be seen is whether "Les Intouchables" will still be a hit once France's current moral crisis has passed. My bet is it will look cute and obsolete in just two years' time.
A version of this op-ed appeared in print on January 25, 2012.