The Big Mop (1966) | Film critic

This film arrived at number 56 in Timeout ranking of the 100 best French films of all time – click here to see the full list.

King of popular comedy, Gérard Oury raised the genre to the rank of art in a few films, from ‘Corniaud’ to ‘Rabbi Jacob’ via ‘La Grande Vadrouille’. The real strength of these comedies is first and foremost that they have stood the test of time. With 17 million admissions when it was released (a record kept until 1998 and the release of ‘Titanic’) and countless television broadcasts, ‘La Grande Vadrouille’ has even established itself as the timeless classic par excellence, filled scenes so famous that they have become an integral part of French cultural heritage. Indeed, the images of the indescribable tandem embodied by Bourvil and Louis de Funès whistling in the Turkish baths, or walking around disguised as Nazis in the countryside, have fed the imagination of the country for thirty years and would almost make us forget the original audacity of the project. . Audacity always dangerous to make people laugh, of course, but what is more with a serious and still contemporary subject for the year 1966: the Second World War. Gérard Oury therefore takes hold of the conflict with a certain detachment, ready to make fun of the Nazis like the two resistance fighters in spite of themselves, Augustin Bouvet and Stanislas Lefort. Above all, the film displays all types of humor – situation comedy, burlesque, puns, absurd – which leaves no respite to the viewer.

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