Hubert Deschamps Movies

Michaud (Michel Serrault) is a timid and anxiety-ridden security-systems technician who is prone to daydreams like Walter Mitty. Continually teased by his colleagues and his taunting alter ego, Michaud is victimized by a fellow employee who tries to implicate him in a bank robbery. He emerges from his emotional isolation and daydreams to help trap the crooks. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

Christophe Malavoy and Francois Cluzet are business partners who are accused of stealing a safe from a wealthy tycoon in this situation comedy. A practical joke backfires when the two make their colleague (Jean -Claude Leguay) believe he has won the lottery. The owner of the safe calls the police, who chase after the scheming duo. The two steal the safe a second time to cover the loss of the money taken in the first burglary. Monique (Veronique Genest) is the sultry police commissioner and former flame of the robbery victim who investigates the bizarre case. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

In one of Coluche's earlier films, the late French comedian stars in this standard comedy by Claude Zidi as the inept police inspector, Michel Clement. The senior Clement was a spectacular policeman, and Michel finds it particularly difficult to try and walk in his father's footsteps without tripping. At the moment he is after Roger Morzini (Gerard Depardieu), a dangerous gangster who eventually kidnaps Marie-Anne Prossant (Dominique Lavanant). She is a journalist traveling with Michel as he tries to track down Morzini. Her objective was to get an interview with the gangster, and now she has more than she bargained for. Meanwhile, Michel tries to get his act together and rescue her. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A triumph of animation for both children and adults, this engaging story was adapted from the fairy tale of The Shepherdess and the Chimney Sweep by Hans Christian Andersen. Director Paul Grimault worked with the late and gifted Jacques Prevert to create the wit, humor, and political nuances that enliven the story each step of the way. The tale is set in the kingdom of Takicardie ("runaway heartbeat") where a beguiling young shepherdess has fallen in love with a charming chimney sweep, and he reciprocates her feelings honorably and completely. Enter the king who wants the shepherdess for himself. A mockingbird, well aware of the situation, helps the lovers out -- until he and the chimney sweep are captured and thrown into the lion's den. Now the two of them have a real challenge on their hands if they want to save the shepherdess and defeat the king. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Dear Inspector and Dear Detective were the English-language titles of Philippe De Broca's Tendre Poulet. Annie Girardot plays the old flame of Greek professor Philippe Noiret. The prof tries to rekindle the flames of passion, but Girardot seems curiously preoccupied. It turns out that she's a detective on the trail of a murderer. The film served as the basis for the 1979 American made-for-TV movie Dear Detective, starring Brenda Vaccaro and Arlen Dean Snyder. A DeBroca-directed sequel, Jupiter's Thigh, was filmed in 1979, again with Annie Girardot and Philippe Noiret. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This off-beat drama is set within the sleazy Pigalle sector of Paris. The tale centers on a song-and-dance team who work in a night club. When not at the club, the two work as prostitutes. One of the women ends up entangled in a kidnapping and is killed. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In this satire, Jean Yanne punctures the pretensions of French show business, from music halls, to classical concert halls and even pornography. In the movie, he plays an indefatigable producer whose efforts sufficiently offend the big money people and the police so that his life is in danger. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

When cancer strikes the mother of the family in this French film, everyone in the family expresses a previously invisible caring and tolerance of the others. The father has always been a bit of a drunk, and is forever chasing younger women. Despite that, he and his wife care for each other, and he tends attentively to her in her last days while remaining unchanged in character. The son and daughter-in-law, whose marriage is somewhat sterile, have similarly penetrating interactions with the dying mother. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

This French film updates a classic tale by Voltaire and uses it as an allegory in which divisions of race and class are explored. In the film, Ingenu (Renaud Verly) is a native of India, working in another country. His charms beguile the youngest daughter of an upper-class family, and she falls in love with him and wants to marry him. This upsets the family for several reasons: he is not wealthy, he is dark-skinned, and he is not of their class. Indeed, before he came along, the daughter was slated to marry a wealthy business tycoon who, even though he was not of the "right" class, at least had money and the right skin color. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Following up 1964's Academy Award nominated L'Homme de Rio, French filmmaker Philippe de Broca wrote and directed this big-screen adaptation of André Couteaux's novel Un monsieur de compagnie. Jean-Pierre Cassel stars as Antoine, a young man who holds the philosophy "Laziness is the mother of all virtue" close to his heart and spends many dreamy days fishing with his wealthy grandfather. But when he has a prophetic dream that the old man will die impoverished, Antoine is motivated to change his life and try to earn his own money. Also starring Catherine Deneuve and Jean-Pierre Marielle, Un monsieur de compagnie was released in the United States in 1966 under the title Male Companion. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide