Intouchables (2011)

Directed by: Olivier Nakache, Eric Toledano | 112 minutes | comedy, drama | Actors: François Cluzet, Omar Sy, Anne Le Ny, Audrey Fleurot, Clotilde Mollet, Alba Gaïa Kraghede Bellugi, Cyril Mendy, Christian Ameri, Grégoire Oestermann, Joséphine de Meaux, Dominique Daguier, François Caron, Dorothée Brière, Marie-Laure Descoureaux, Emilie Caen, Sylvain Lazard, Jean François Cayrey

How do you objectively assess one of the greatest French cinema hits ever? Moreover, a film that has caused quite a stir because of alleged racism. Very simple: by not caring about all of that and just completely openly undergoing the experience called ‘Intouchables’. And guess what? Not only does the film invite laughter, but at the same time it makes you feel the mental pain of someone with a physical disability or a social disadvantage. Ignore the whole discussion about racism, ‘Intouchables’ is simply a rare sincere portrait of two seemingly impossible friends. A very intelligent script combined with excellent acting and an incredibly tasty soundtrack. Unprecedented class!

The film is based on the true story of a French millionaire who is paralyzed from the chin after an accident and eventually hires an underprivileged Arab as a caretaker because he is the only one who does treat him like a human being. The fact that he was changed into an African for the film, among other things, makes people prance. Don’t wear anything. It is important that the person in question (Driss, played wholeheartedly by Omar Sy) comes from a ‘banlieu’, a deprived area. Seemingly maladjusted and disinterested, upon closer inspection, Driss turns out to be a twistedly intelligent boy, who simply automatically got society against it and started acting on it.

But when he comes to a job interview with millionaire Philippe (a simply gorgeous François Cluzet) and asks if he wants to sign for his arrival so that he can collect his benefits, his inappropriateness is appreciated. Driss has to come back the next day, because signing an autograph for a completely paralyzed person is no mean feat. Coincidentally, Driss is kicked out of the house by his mother the same day, because he has not been heard from for three months. (He turns out to have been in prison.) So when it turns out that Philippe wants him as a caretaker and gives him board and lodging in addition to a generous salary, Driss is willing to take up the challenge.

What follows is a heartbreakingly honest account of two completely different people who turn out to have very compatible characters. Two men who dare to cross borders, who dare to trust each other. Driss has to bathe Philippe and wipe his ass, but damn if he’s not one of the few who treat the cripple like a person. Unlike all those highly educated white caregivers. Driss is open to Philippe’s world of visual arts, opera and Chopin, but in turn Philippe likes to be convinced by Earth Wind & Fire (which produces one of the happiest dance scenes in film history).

‘Intouchables’, although not completely devoid of stereotypes, nevertheless tries to break through these. The film cleverly plays with viewer expectations and fulfills them just as often as not, leaving you continuously uncertain about the progress. This ensures that the film retains a blistering tension. A tension that is regularly neutralized on purpose with wonderful humour. Anyone who calls the film racist, for example because a black person is a white person’s assistant, has not understood the message. What the film wants to make clear is precisely that the people who populate the suburbs are capable of so much more than politics and perhaps the majority of ‘pure’ French people dare or want to realize. Give people a fair chance. That’s all.