Mon Pere, çe Heros / My Father, The Hero
MON PÈRE, CE HÉROS (PG)
D: Gérard Lauzier
Gala/Film Par Film/DD/Canal (Jean-Louis
Livi)
France 1991
104 mins
Comedy
W: Gérard Lauzier
DP: Patrick Blossier
Ed: Georges Klotz
Mus: François Bernheim
Gerard Depardieu (Andre Arnel), Marie Gillain
(Veronique Arnel), Patrick Mille (Benjamin), Catherine Jacob (Christelle), Charlotte de Turckheim (Irena), Jean-François Rangasamy (Pablo)
Tepid French farce in which a teenage girl, on a
summer holiday with her father and vying for the attentions of a boy she fancies, spins a web of lies that her father is a secret agent and she is his lover.
It has moments of amusement, but it's all in quite
poor taste. An American remake, also starring Gerard Depardieu in the lead, was marginally better, although neither film is really worth writing home about.
4/10
MY FATHER, THE HERO (PG)
D: Steve Miner
Touchstone/Cité (Jacques Bar & Jean-Louis
Livi)
US 1994
90 mins
Comedy
W: Francis Veber & Charlie Peters [based on the
screenplay "Mon Père, Ce Héros" by Gerard Lauzier]
DP: Daryn Okada
Ed: Marshall Harvey
Mus: David Newman
Gerard Depardieu (André Arnel), Katherine Heigl (Nicole
Arnel), Emma Thompson (Isobel), Dalton James (Ben), Lauren Hutton (Megan Arnel), Faith Prince (Diana), Stephen Tobolowsky (Mike)
Based on the French farce Mon Père, Ce Héros (qv), which
also had Gerard Depardieu in the lead, this remake sees him star alongside Katherine Heigl as his troublesome daughter and is slightly better in its execution, though some of the jokes are
still rather bad taste.
On a holiday, she pretends her father is her lover so she
can pass for an older woman. That's pretty much the long and short of it.
Katherine Heigl, in one of her earliest roles, brings a
bit of cute sassiness, as well as sweet innocence, to the daughter role.
Enjoyable enough for the duration, but very easy to
forget.
4/10
