Surprisingly, non-verbal physical comedy doesn't have the big advantage vaulting over continental borders that you might expect, and this smash example of Euro-slapstick (it topped THE GODFATHER at the French box-office) came across as too deliciously low to find its deserved Stateside market. (A botched Mel Brooks edit with English dubbing got nowhere. - see poster) It now wears a patina of innocence as escalating tensions between Arabs, Jews, racist Frenchmen & police make a farce like this all but unthinkable. But filmmaker Gerard Oury’s rough & ready silliness, in a story that nods toward SOME LIKE IT HOT (bigot hides under Rabbinical garb to avoid Mid-East killers), now has a nostalgic pull amidst the pratfalls. Louis de Funes, hardly a subtle clown, is most effective here, and well partnered by some outstandingly funny supporting players. Watch for the hat-or-no-hat scene in a synagogue, and the following prayer shawl escape. Give this a try as a first foreign language with subtitles pic for the kids.
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