In sharp contradiction of its title (translated Dead Tired), this is a frisky and reckless bit of cinephiliac fun, written and directed by, and starring, Michel Blanc. As himself. The premise sets up like so: Blanc's life and work have started to be disrupted (a middle-of-the-night rousting by the cops, etc.) as a consequence of scandalous escapades of which he himself has no memory. Has he become some sort of Jekyll-and-Hyde split personality, with one half not knowing what the other half is up to? No, it's not that old gag. It's instead the old doppelgänger gag, otherwise known as the Prince-and-the-Pauper gag, otherwise known as the Prisoner-of-Zenda gag: a dead ringer who has been passing himself off as Blanc and abusing the privilege. The fun would no doubt be more so if we in the U.S. -- we at the mercy of fickle foreign-film distribution -- had a better idea who Blanc is. (Monsieur Hire was clearly an out-of-character role for him.) And the friskiness and recklessness go careeningly out of control after Blanc voluntarily switches places with his double for the purposes of a vacation (Gerard Depardieu evidently enjoys a similar arrangement: "Ever wonder how Depardieu makes so many movies? It's humanly impossible"), and then cannot reclaim his own former life. Even as a joke on the innate superficiality of cinema, or superficiality of its fans, this won't stand up to inspection. Looking is not acting. With (also as themselves) Carole Bouquet, Philippe Noiret, Roman Polanski, Mathilda May, Charlotte Gainsbourg. (1995) — Duncan Shepherd
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