Comedy

Laugh-out loud funny French comedy about two middle-aged Parisians out to reconnect and chill out in Greece. Starring Laure Calamy, Olivia Côte, Kristin Scott-Thomas. Directed by Marc Fitoussi.

Synopsis

Socially inept and isolated since her divorce, radiologist Blandine (Olivia Côte) is set up by her son Benjamin (Alexandre Desrousseaux) on a ‘blind date’ with pal Magalie (Laura Calamy). The two haven’t seen each other in years after a falling out and have grown up as wildly different people – Blandine is a sensible, sober 9-5er, and Magalie is a carefree, wild child who flits from job to job.

They take a trip to a Greek island made famous by the film The Big Blue (1988) to make good on a teenage pact and hook up with Magalie’s friend ‘Bijou’ (Kristin Scott-Thomas). A voyage of discovery awaits all three women.

Review, by @Reelreviewer

Is it me, or does Greece look staggeringly beautiful in every movie set on/around here, the Aegean and Peloponnese?

It certainly gets a good showing off in this sort-of mash-up of Mamma Mia! (2008. Also set in Greece) and Romy and Michelle’s High School Reunion (1997. Set in Venice, Los Angeles), all sun-kissed locales, gorgeous beaches, shimmering pools and strikingly white-washed walls.

I half-read some reviews of Two Tickets to Greece before watching it that revealed the usual schism between the tastes of the public (who seemed to love the movie) and established critics (who, because the production isn’t the modern era’s Citizen Kane (1941), want you to avoid it).

Well, sod the critics because with or without the lovely locales, this film is a belter.

From the trailer, I expected a drippy, dappy, drawn-out ‘man-hating epic’ as three single old broads cruise the Grecian isles for young stud-gods for fun and general post-coital denigration. But Two Tickets to Greece is a markedly different movie.

For one thing, the male characters are treated congenially and respectfully, even though they are all peripheral features. This pro-woman movie is not anti-man.

Secondly, it’s rib-tickling funny from the get-go until the closing credits. The dialogue is whip-smart, takes great delight in the fun of sex and relationships (the script comes across like a French Lubitsch comedy) and the characters are beautifully drawn, fully-fleshed out, consistent personalities. It is a joy to spend time with them, listen to them, get to know them through their antics, and see them inch their way forward in as they develop and form new social bonds and reconcile old issues.

Most importantly, all three women get to know themselves better, culminating in joyous sequences as Bijou reaffirms her fidelity to her partner after a cancer worry, Magalie embarks on a surprising new career that could lead to her finally settling down, and Blandine goes on a night-time roller skating session, a sport she loved but abandoned when she became a contracted professional.

Performance-wise, the main plaudits go to Laure Calamy as the uninhibited and economical, perennial party girl Magalie who shoplifts clothes for a night out (but returns them the next day), who is always short of cash but has travelled the world and has good friends in every corner of it.

Not far behind Calay are Côte as the plucky, reserved and blandly named Blandine and a joyous Scott-Thomas as their English aristocrat-turned-Grecian-gal Lavinia/’Bijou’, whose island villa serves as the crucible for personal development.

See the official trailer here.

Cast & credits

Director: Marc Fitoussi. 111mins/1hr 51mins. Avenue B Productions/Vito Films/Blonde Audiovisual Productions/Scope Pictures/France 3 Cinéma/Radio Télévision Belge Francophone (RTBF)/Proximus. (15).

Producers: Caroline Bonmarchand, Isaac Sharry.
Writers: Marc Fitoussi.
Camera: Antoine Roch.
Music: Mocky.
Sets: Valentine Dubus Ventura, Aliki Kouvaka.

Laure Calamy, Olivia Côte, Kristin Scott-Thomas, Alexandre Desrousseaux, Nicolas Bridet, Panos Koronis, Leelou Laridan, Marie Mallia.