Michel Serrault

Eight-year-old Elsa (Bouanich) and her mom Isabelle (Dieu) move in next to Julien (Serrault), an ornery old entomologist with a lavish butterfly collection in his apartment. Her mother is hardly ever home, and Elsa soon grows attached to her neighbor. (First Run Features)

This film powerfully evokes the spectacular Rhone Alps, the beauty, simplicity and hardships of farm life, taking chances and dealing with the necessary sacrifices, the ever-present conflict between city and rural, past and present, the cycles of nature and life. (Films Philos)

This movie is inspired by a true story, which occurred in the trenches of the World War I battlefield on Christmas Eve in 1914. When war breaks out in the lull of summer 1914, it surprises and pulls millions of men in its wake. Christmas arrives, with its snow and multitude of family and army presents. But the surprise won't come from inside the generous parcels which lie in the French, Scottish, and German trenches. (imdb)

A man is killed by his wife and mistress, but his body disappears. What is going on? (imdb)

A chronicle of a group of friends in rural France in 1918. Garris and Riton live in Marais, a quiet region along the banks of Loire river... (imdb)

This parody of the detective-story genre merrily detours into spoofing French foibles as well, making it more of an exercise in verbal gymnastics than a narrative with a mission (imdb)

During the latter part of World War I, Private Charles Plumpick is chosen to go into the French town... (imdb)

Solange is depressed: she's stopped smiling, she eats little, she says less. She has fainting fits.... (imdb)

One very full day in the life of Denis Diderot -- the 18th century philosopher and libertine who wrote the first encyclopedia -- during which he dodges the law, the church, his wife, and his definition of morality. (filmaffinity.com)

Les Acteurs is a satirical take on the ups, downs, and numerous implications of life in showbiz as told by a variety of real-life French actors. (Tracie Cooper, Rovi)

Betty and Victor are a pair of scam artists. One day Betty brings in Maurice, a treasurer of a multinational company... (imdb)

Beauvoir, lonely, aging private detective, is put on the bloody track of beautiful Catherine Leiris... (imdb)

Two gay men living in St. Tropez have their lives turned upside down when the son of one of the men announces he is getting married. They try conceal their lifestyle and their ownership of the transvestite club downstairs when the fiancée and her parents come for dinner. (imdb)

Sequel to La Cage aux folles has homosexual nightclub owner Renato and his transvesitite companion/lover Albin becoming involved with the local cops and foreign spies when Albin unwittingly gets his hands on a role of stolen microfilm. The gay couple then hide out in Renato's native Italy, but find little peace there with their frequent bickering among themselves. (imdb)

Third and final version of the La Cage aux Folles series has Renato's drag queen lover Albin learning that he can inherit a vast fortune from a distant relative. But the catch is that Albin must marry (a woman) and produce a heir within a year or the whole inheritance will be forfeited. (imdb)

Inspector Gallien is investigating the rape and murder of two little girls. The only suspect is attorney Jerome Martinaud, but the evidence against him is circumstantial. As the city celebrates New Year's Eve, Gallien calls Martinaud to his office and interrogates him for hour after hour while Martinaud continues to maintain his innocence... (imdb)

A hatter in a provincial town (Michel Serrault) leads the life of a respectable citizen but is in fact a serial murderer. The only person to suspect this is his neighbour the tailor... (IMDB Comments)

When Nelly, a woman being just divorced, meets by chance M. Arnaud, a mature salesman just retired, begins a strange and special relationship between the two personalities. (imdb)

Black comedy about solitude and dishumanization of the modern world, through the adventures of three men. (IMDB)

A collection of artifacts from an archeological dig in Egypt are brought to the famous Louvre museum in Paris, and while experts are using a laser scanning device to determine the age of a sarcophagus, a ghostly spirit escapes and makes its way into the museum's electrical system. Museum curator Faussier (Jean-Francois Balmer) brings in a noted Egyptologist, Glenda Spencer, to examine the findings, and she announces that the mummy inside the coffin was actually the evil spirit Belphegor. (imdb)

A modern-day Parisian town crier gradually learns that someone is using him to give cryptic warnings of a plague outbreak in the city. (imdb)

Nightclub entertainer Jean Clery has just become engaged to Lili, his attractive psychoanalyst. Meanwhile, the nightclub where he works is being used by a counterfeit ring, and Paris police suspect owner Paul Latour of being the ringleader. Finding it expedient to leave town, Paul leaves his "baby" daughter with Jean...who discovers too late that she's a wild, carefree, shapely sex-kitten with a talent for getting Jean into amusing scrapes.

Old professional killer Wagner seeks someone to teach what he knows as long as he is already dying, and he chooses Max, young and passionless thief to be his successor. (imdb)

In this French science fiction thriller, nuclear war breaks out over Europe, and a group of visitors to a local chateau take cover in the basement. When they venture outside after the fighting stops, they discover that the chateau has sustained serious damage and the surrounding lands have been laid to waste. (allmovie.com)

When he investigates his daughter's disappearance, a bookseller discovers an underground society, living literally under the streets of Paris. (imdb)

A somewhat romanticized story about the young Artemisia Gentileschi, the first acclaimed female painter of European art.

Set in 1913, 1936 and 2001. When he returns to the casino and seaside resort of his early teens, Louis, a 78 year old man encounters Olivia, a 19 year old young woman madly in love with a violent cad. Louis tells the story of his own mother having a passionate, driven fling with his Italian tennis instructor in 1936, and of Marie Collins Brown, the slightly older widowed woman who helped him through his confusion and pain (imdb)

The president of a political party enlists a comedian to take his place as he hides from an escaped criminal.

This movie tells the story of a group of right-wing cops have begun carrying out vigilante justice on drug dealers and other crime figures who might otherwise avoid punishment for their misdeeds. Police inspector Grindel (Delon) understands the feelings which motivate these deeds, but does not approve. However, he is not highly motivated to put an end to the group's activities until it begins to appear that they are now attacking fellow cops for reasons which are unclear. (imdb)

Doctor Galipeau has a brother, Emile, whose wife has just given birth to a baby boy and who dreams of owning a house. He has just examined Louis Martinet, an old man who, according to him, is in the last stages. That is why he advises Emile to purchase Martinet's house for an annuity. Unfortunately for the Galipeaus, not only does Martinet recover but, month after month, year after year, the "dying man" proves hale and hearty as well! (imdb)

Jean Yanne directs and stars in this French comedy. He plays a radio reporter who is fired when he recounts on the air just how his brave colleagues report on Latin American revolutions: from a lounge chair next to the pool of a luxury hotel, or from cabanas along the beach. He is briefly hired back to run the station but gets fired yet again when he airs an exposé of phony name-brand products. (Allmovie)

This is one of the French comedies made in the early '70s featuring the musicians-turned-comedians, Les Charlots. They play a group of inept but good-hearted fellows who help a small market owner compete with a large supermarket across the street by shoplifting enough from the big store to enable the smaller store to carry on. The store owner is able to re-do his little store and, though it offers little competition to the larger one, he is bought out for a lot of money. (Allmovie)

The setting for this story is Rahatlcoum, a Roman colony in North Africa, but the "colonists" watch television, have gay bars, trade unions, and traffic problems. A gay Jules César's expensive vacation causes the population to grumble and gripe, they would rather have mechanic Ben Hur Marcel take Jules' place as their exalted leader. Once she gets out of jail, Cleopatra declares that old Ben is actually her long-lost half-brother. (Allmovie)

An overly ambitious young man hopes to rise to the top of the advertising business. When he feels his progress is being impeded, he conspires to murder his way up the corporate ladder. He uses the bodies of his victims as rungs to climb to the top in this macabre comedy of errors. (Allmovie)

Max and Riton, two lousy thugs, acting under the direction of Fano. After a missed break, he dismisses them before offering them to remember the biggest coup of the century : to steal funds from the pension fund of SNCF stored in a safe in the Gare de l'Est. To steal money, they imagine opening the chest through the toilets of the station. Thus, under various disguises, they manage to win the booty at the same time as full of surprises will arise during their long and audacious operation ... (Wikipédia)

When the Parisian bourgeois Geneviève Le Theil travels to Dijon to resolve outstanding subjects in the inheritance left by her wealthy aunt, she mistakenly opens the door of another room in the hotel, finding a suicidal near death on the bed. Later Geneviève goes to the hospital and is introduced to Renaud Sarti, the nihilistic alcoholic vagrant she saved. Geneviève falls in love for Renaud and brings him to her apartment in Paris. (imdb)

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. (Allmovie)

Eugene Ballanchon is working on the development of a truth gas, but discovers an exhilarating gas, capable of neutralizing the enemy.

The inspector Robert Staniland, a quite special cop, investigates the murder of the pianist Charly Berliner. He discovers that the victim had a passionate affair with a certain Barbara, who turns out to be a femme fatale.

Alfred doesn't work. He lets his wife do that. Instead, he plays the horses, and wanders about, hitchhiking. His sly laziness serves him in good stead when he is kidnapped by people he thought were giving him a ride. He wakes from unconsciousness in a coffin in Istanbul, pockets full of counterfeit cash. Another gang, not the one that kidnapped him, accosts him and tries to find out what kind of smuggling scheme would send him in the coffin; (Allmovie)

Nicolas Pappas and Leon Dubois, two particularly calamitous killers, arrive in Paris where an evil gang leader urges them to cover the escape of the perpetrators of a robbery. They are doing so, and then see themselves responsible for liquidating a certain "Magnum" ...

Lots of people wish they could be someone else, but a French businessman decides to do something about it in this satirical comedy. Francis Bergeade (Michel Serrault) runs a factory in a small town that makes toilet seats. With his employees on strike and his wife plundering his bank account as she plans their daughter's wedding, Francis's life isn't much fun; his one real pleasure is eating and drinking well, in the company of his friend Gerard (Eddy Mitchell).

Two little seedy villains, Hyacinthe (a former cop) and Arsène are trying unsuccessfully to roll Alexandre Larsan-Bellac, a high-class crook. This one will use them to mount a big blow that will succeed, but not in the sense that the three protagonists hoped ... (Wikipedia)

The life story of the titular Beaumarchais (Fabrice Luchini), playwright and adventurer, who gets himself into numerous different scrapes and romantic encounters in 18th Century France. (imdb)

The King Dagobert's intestinal and sexual problems loom large as he survives an attack on his royal caravan then barely makes it to Rome to personally give thanks to the Pope. After he arrives at the Vatican, he becomes involved in the battle between two contenders for the papacy and has to face the machinations of a ruthless Byzantine princess. (Allmovie)

Marcel, a simple-minded factory worker, is tricked into buying a high-priced American convertable car by a widow determined not to let it fall into the hands of her late husband's secretary/secret lover. Once in pocession of the car, Marcel only encounters one bad luck episode after another with the excessive gasoline consumtion, his wife trying to sell it to make ammends meet, getting into traffic jams, accidently riding into a car wash with the top down, and more. (imdb)

The industrial Gourmic, with the help of his brother-in-law Malju, retyping is a dilapidated house into a home spa and resell it to a minister. The construction contractor isn't a very honest kind and it is also the mayor of the spa. Conflicts between the characters are numerous delays in the completion, termination of moonlighting, damage or threat. (Wikipedia)

In Paris, a women's bag, which contains an embarrassing letter from the french president, is stolen. (imdb)

Sophie, Viscountess of Valrude, thinks herself a widow since her husband disappeared in the Amazon. Bertrand, a real estate developer who now shares her life, invites the Minister of the Quality of Culture, whom he intends to use to address his flailing business. Thus the minister finds himself in the castle with his secretary and mistress...

Jockey Jack has a bill open with a gangster just released from jail. He somehow manages to parry the gangster's knife attack backstage at a theatre and the latter ends up dead being put into a double bass case. A day later the gangster mysteriously has disappeared, but it turns out that he was carrying a bet ticket for a horse race now worth over a million. A turbulent run for the money begins. (imdb)

From real Dr Petiot's life. During world war II Petiot, a M.D. in occupied Paris, promised to rich jew persons among his patients to pass them in Spain. In fact he drugged them and burnt them in his coal-range, steeling their wells. After Liberation he was condemned to death. (imdb)

After an unfortunate initiative the financial advisor Benoît Lepape is dismissed. He convinces his uncle, a union activist, to invest funds of the union and apply capitalist methods in a successful bicycle business, and then in a model electronics factory.

Overnight, Paris is invaded - although peacefully - but the Chinese Army, and millions of Chinese people... It's the Nazi occupation all over again, with modern - funny - twists. (imdb)

In April 1789, the commander of the faithful left Baghdad for Paris to acquire the salon equipment executioner (the Sicob) an infallible guillotine, because the pal no distracted him. Presentation follows a parody of the Revolution which will see Louis XVI to escape to get not to Varennes but in Baghdad . (Wikipedia)

For inspector Baroni,Monsieur Morlaix is the main suspect who might have killed his wife. (imdb)

Paul Martin and François Leroux are brothers-in-law, friends, room-mates and gagmen without fame. But one day, one of the most famous television comics, Gaëtan, who has just laid off two his gagmen considered too old and not original enough, finds himself in the little theater where Paul and François where they produce themselves under the name of "Gagsters". (Wikipedia)

Penniless and vegetating as a clerk, Baron Yves de Kerfuntel incidentally learns the death of a wealthy uncle. Believing himself the sole heir, he rushes to the castle, and discovered 7 other candidates to fortune. The opening of the will they learn that Louise de Kerfuntel, crippled old woman and authoritarian, is the only one heir. She allows all family members to live in the castle, but announces that it intends to squander his fortune to games and by conducting a grand scale. (Wikipedia)

Leon de Paris is a modest dog-barber in Paris. In search of more satisfaction. Thanks to the economic helps of Fanny (his terrible mother in law), he succeeds to set up in Roma a very stylish "Coiffeur pour homme". But due to this, his life with Fanny isn't funny, and more, Leon has to dissimulate homosexuality for job reasons. He decides to stop this nightmare engaging "Er Cuculo" (the cuckoo) a B-gangster to simulate a robbery

The roman catholic pilgrimage to Lourdes depicted in an anticlerical way :hypocrisy, superstition and business. (imdb)

An industrialist would have everything to live happily if his family did not cause him so much worry.

Mr. Luke, the man of all bankruptcies must restore the dilapidated castle Montverdier. One solution: the relay into luxury tourism, Room Service. Funds miss him, when he learns that Fernand, the baker, just won 5 billion of cents at Loto. (Allocine)

Gabriel Pelletier's life is no bed of roses. Not because of his job: he is a successful sales manager. But on account of the various wrongdoings committed by his kin : his daughter Nicole, who has just developed an infatuation with a young man who is the son of a Sicilian mobster, Bernard, his brother-in-law, a ladies'man, Albert, his own brother, an avant-garde filmmaker also in trouble with Lombardi, the omnipresent gangster and Maryse, his domestic worker who is a Maoist militant! (imdb)

Bank executive Rainier allows his firm to deliver adventurous investor Chevalier d'Aven a huge loan, with what he thinks is his employer Mirement's total backing. Chevalier's business proves indeed to be disastrous, which forces the bank to cover up its high deficits. News of the scandal breaks out, and the bank now sees Rainier as the one being responsible for it - he is laid off. Wife Celine and union representative Arlette suggest he should sue his former boss. (imdb)

Moreau and Dubois, two friends decide to take a few days holiday in Deauville with their wives and the niece of one of them. However, the stay does not go as planned: a complicated journey, a home more than uncomfortable and uninhabitable villa come to torment the lives of two friends. (Allocine)

Forty eight hours in an area around a Parisian canal where a former Tango champion meets a killer. (imdb)

Jean-Louis Matouzec works for French National Library as an expert looking after the restoration of old manuscripts.He falsifies marriage certificates as his wife refuses divorce. (imdb)

Michel Dolannes resigns from a major newspaper as a journalist to launch a new journal 'Le Cosmopolite' which reveals all kinds of shady deals.One day, he is killed but who is the killer ? (imdb)

Gaston Berrien is a hatter and father of a boy and a girl of 17 years. One day arrives in his shop a customer whose concern is much more to know his turnover than to find a hat to his size. The trader is right to worry, because his trade is only a cover.

In this wartime comedy, Robert Lamoureux plays a General in the Resistance. With an unlikely team of French patriots, he easily outwits the buffoonish Germans and steals the master copy of their plans to invade England. By doing so, he prevents the invasion and makes it more likely that the Allies will win the war. (Allmovie)

To replace Hector Grogenol, the tyrannical boss of the factory "Tout pour la camping", put out of harm's way, collaborators call on his cousin Achille, a Provencal shepherd, thinking to use him. But this one will very quickly take his role of CEO seriously and show itself velléitaire. Fortunately, the young secretary Martine, will know how to use her charms to calm this man thirsting for power.

The history of the Vajont Dam disaster, which in 1963 caused the death of about 2.000 people.

In a Mediterranean city, the Rescue Volunteer Association expects a new director. A former trade unionist, Birgos, escaped from an asylum with Cleo, another internee, is taken for the replacement. While volunteers are used as free labor by the mayor and a local mafia Don Frisco, Birgos creates the union volunteers and requires compensation for their work. (Wikipedia)

An East European scientist smuggled out of his country by the French is supposed to perfect his invention in suburban Paris, but he is much more interested in having a good time. (imdb)

A band of young people, led by Frankie, opens a nightclub just above the hideout of a gangster named Morelli. This one disturbed by the noise while he prepares a new holdup, tries by all the means to chase them. The young people will find the help of a man once rolled by Morelli ...

Having first lost his wife then his job as a tweed tailor, Alex Ponttin (Michel Serrault from Happiness is in the field) has devised a novel way to keep himself in touch with society. He admits himself into people's homes, by pretending to be a relative or an official, and persuading his victims to give him a night's free board: He finds at first a lunch at the horrible couple Dumont (Jean-Pierre Bisson and Maike Jansen), where a thief follows him for a robbery.

Patrick Lechat learns that his father, the famous writer Jo Lechat, has died leaving a huge fortune. Albert Moulinot, half-brother of Jo, lives deep in the Dordogne. It is the sole beneficiary of the legacy of Jo Lechat. While Patrick will meet Albert. The latter is quite ready to give up his inheritance because he does not want anything, it is for the abolition of money. Only Patrick must bring Albert to Paris to sign his waiver of inheritance. This will take longer than expected ... (Wikipedia)

Burglar Albert Lecagneux is caught red handed in the home of Philippe d'Artois. However, Philippe d'Artois was contemplating committing suicide and asks Albert to kill him in exchange for money.

Félix Mandel, an internationally renowned astrophysicist, is married with a four-year-old son and often has his head in the clouds. (imdb)

An unemployed investor creates a fictious business partner to attempt to improve business. Eventually, his creation gets out of control as his business becomes successful and his wife announces that she is in love with the partner and his son wishes the partner was his father -- although no one has ever seen him. To regain control, the man decides to "kill" his imaginary partner and is arrested for the murder. (imdb)

Lady M. wades every morning through the sea in order to heal her pain. But she is not what she pretends to be: Together with her partner Pompilius she finances her luxurious life by fraud and blackmailing. Falling in love with young Lambert she is about to break up all her pretendence as Pompilius is not willing to accept the youngster. (imdb)

Michel, a referee, has to suffer the consequences of having whistled a penalty against a team which is supported by football hooligans. (imdb)

What shall we do with our folks when we, young ones,want to have fun and to make the best of our life ? (imdb)

Paul and Thérèse sold their coffee shop near an airport to buy another one in Marseille. All is well until they find out that their shop serves as a hub for drug trafficking. In order to stop trafficking, they rekindle the gang war.

Darius Caunes, a small engraver and boss of a small printing company, leads a life above suspicion. In fact, he is the author of a perfect crime, that of his wife, two years before and the creator of counterfeit notes of five hundred francs. But the day when a grain of sand will stop the machine, he will have to adapt to his new profession: old scoundrel and murderer.