Camden New Journal - Movies: My Best Friend (Mon Meilleur Ami)

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The Review - AT THE MOVIES with WILLIAM HALL
Published: 10 May 2007

Daniel Auteuil (right) as François with his new taxi-driver companion Bruno (Dany Boon) in My Best Friend

A French soufflé to savour

MY BEST FIREND (MON MEILLEUR AMI)
Directed by Patrice Leconte
Certificate 12A

WE open on one of those dinner parties where someone makes the mistake of blurting out the truth.
Antiques dealer François Coste (Daniel Auteuil) is the fall guy who rises to the bait when his mistress (Julie Gayet), accuses him of having no friends – no real friends, that is – and he rashly bets a £150,000 Grecian vase he has just bought at auction to prove her wrong.
His frantic search to find a soul partner – with a deadline of 10 days – sends him searching through his contacts file (no takers) all the way back to his schooldays, where his one “best friend” reveals he was really thought of as a nasty little creep, despised by all his classmates.
Where to turn? Salvation finally comes in the unlikely form of a know-it-all taxi driver called Bruno (Dany Boon) who takes him around Paris spouting the kind of trivia in the way Michael Caine would say: “Not a lot of people know that!”
Within a week they have become bosom pals.
The climax – surprisingly tense – comes on Who Wants to be a Millionaire?, when on live television the cabbie has to “phone a friend” to win a million Euros.
He calls the dealer – but will his new-found chum give him the right answer, or feed him a deliberate wrong one to show that true friendship can’t be bought?
The cast is flawless, led by the charismatic Daniel Auteuil with his world-weary features which read like a map of his mis-spent life.
Salute a delicious soufflé of gentle romance and risibility, with a feel-good after-taste that you’ll savour for days.

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