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MY BEST FRIEND
Directed by: Patrice Leconte.
Produced by: Olivier Delbosc & Marc Missonnier.
Written by: Jérôme Tonnerre & Leconte, based on a story by Olivier Dazat.
Director of photography: Jean-Marie Dreujou.
Edited by: Joëlle Hache.
Music by: Xavier Demerliac.
Released by IFC Films.
Language: French with English subtitles.
Country of Origin: France. 95 min. Rated PG-13.
With: Daniel Auteuil, Dany Boon, Julie Gayet, Julie Durand, Jacques Mathou, Marie Pillet, Elizabeth Bourgine, Henri Garçin & Jacques Spiesser.

A thoroughly amicable art-house offering doubles as a genre film in director Patrice Leconte’s graceful take on the buddy comedy, which follows an obvious route, but not by rote.

Daniel Auteuil plays François, a driven and well-to-do Parisian antiques art dealer, a role not unlike his philandering corporate chieftain in the farce The Valet, where his main goal in life is also to clinch the deal. But the difference between the two comedies is like the contrast between a ticking cuckoo clock and a digital watch. The Valet hits all of its plot twists and turns broadly, while the more understated My Best Friend depends more on the actors’ performances and the observant script, with a dose of drama thrown in.

François is just the sort who would take a call during a funeral at the start of the film. Never missing a challenge, and on a whim, he places the winning bid in an auction war for an ancient Greek vase commemorating the friendship between Achilles and Patroclus, the cost of which places his small firm in a financial hole.

At an impeccably lit restaurant, François mocks his newly deceased client in front of colleagues, stating that only seven people were at the memorial service. His business partner, Catherine (Julie Gayet), hits the nail on its head when she points out that he doesn’t really have any friends either, a fact apparent to everyone else at the table. Stymied and stammering, he challenges her assumption and agrees to a bet: to produce a best friend in 10 days, and then she’ll write off the debt. If she wins, she keeps the vase.

The outcome is never in doubt (there are only so many characters for François to choose from). His most likely savoir: Bruno, a taxi driver who’s head is stuffed to the brim with trivial facts that he’s only a little too eager to share with his passengers. Like Auteuil, Dany Boon (another Valet vet) never succumbs to caricature. Auteuil keeps his emotions buttoned down. Boon outwardly displays all his feelings.

In fact, compared to Leconte’s recent Man on the Train or Intimate Strangers, his latest may not be enigmatic, but unlike those two films, Leconte doesn’t have a moment to spare, working from his and Jérôme Tonnerre’s lean script. Startlingly, the film embraces male friendship without any sign of a wink or a nod to gay panic. (Lovers in many interpretations, Achilles and Patroclus are not even a comic target.) Sincere but never cloying, My Best Friend smartly blends high brow and popular culture. Let’s just say that a certain global television phenomenon, huge in the U.S. around 2000, plays a key part in the story. Kent Turner
July 16, 2007