Customer Reviews

May Fools ( Milou en mai ) ( Milou a maggio ) [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.4 Import - Australia ]

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With a hint of Renoir's Rules of the Game as well as Chekov's Cherry Orchard, and everything in between this town and country comedy begins with the tragedy of the family matriarchs death. The extended family gathers for a weekend funeral but the ceremony is delayed because of a workers strike which has brought life to a standstill. In the stillness of the country the weekend turns into an extended retreat that becomes more and more bohemian and brazen as the country air and contact with the soil has put each character in contact with their true desires and it seems everyone is with the wrong person. An all day picnic in the sun turns into a partner swapping party but is interrupted at the last minute when rumours of government collapse reach the isolated country estate. Fearing that an all out revolution has begun the family packs up and hikes into the woods until they finally end up in a cave in an ultimate act of cultural regression. Great cast of characters make up the family members and their spouses and lovers(including hippie, lesbian, revolutionary student, resentful daughter, unsupecting heiress maid, ....). The odd assortment makes for a volatile social mix leading to all kinds of destabilising conversations and confrontations which threaten to undermine the family structure from within. Malle cleverly has the family itself come unhinged as they attempt to act out in the personal sphere those revolutionary philosophies being put forth in the public. Everyone has different notions so the result is chaos, unrestrained anarchy, but it remains funny and entertaining all the way through. As well Malle provides wise and pointed observations with a surprising amount of social insight along the way. In short you get a lot more than you might have bargained for but you're glad to get it.

Urban, suburban, rootless, nomadic: if these words describe your experience, this film will leave you cold. Agrarian, transplanted, uprooted, trying to re-connect to a rich family tradition? This film is for you. The plight of a man who is part of the land, and whose land is part of him, really moved me. This film asks, "What do you value, and why?" It affirms the worth of connectedness, continuity, and deep roots, while challenging our cultural idols of speed, change, and the new.

. . . and it comes from France! Set around a funeral, a family gathered - perhaps for the very last time - in grief, and in the midst of a near-revolution, The May Fools manages to cover the entire history of the 60s through hope, euphoria, and paranoia, back to a cynical, sad reality. Still one of the funniest movies ever made.

I am fortunate to have an old video tape of it. I am writing this in the hope that someday it will be released on DVD for American audiences.

Malle really outdoes Bunuel in this movie-- I really enjoyed this one, where I thought Bunuel fell far short of the mark. A nice collection of characters here. The only one besides the old guy digging mom's grave who is actually working class is the lorry driver, who seems to have a somewhat conservative outlook (rather like much of the working class in the US these days). A lot of chuckles and insights here, and it applies well to current day-- think of a current-day spoiled rich family hearing about the occupy movement on the radio, getting paranoid and melting down out of their guilt, fears and greed.

I watched this one from the Louis Malle vol 2 collection, Optimum World region 2 release-- all the other films in the set were good too, I highly recommend it.

Human failings come out in the wake of a family death.
A son that never left his mother or their family's country vacation farm, finds his quiet unambitious life upended by her death.
1960s French society seems to be on the verge of collapse, and folly breaks out.

All the generations are seen as fragile, and transitory, finally just quickly fading memories.

A movie that reveals the secret, pay attention.
Laughter is the only rational response.

We need a Region 1 release of this masterpiece.

Louis Malle's superb social satire set during the time of the Paris student demonstrations in 1968. A large family gathers at the rural estate of the just-deceased matriarch. They are a varied bunch, but most of them are motivated by one thing: greed. Their only thought is how to divide up the property. But 1968 is a chaotic time, not only politically, but sexually too: the sexual revolution has begun and Malle pokes a great deal of fun at it through the blossoming horniness of these people. When reports from Paris are at their worst, the family deserts the estate and wanders the countryside overnight, fearing they will be targets of the communists. The contrast between the supposedly altruistc "revolution" unfolding on the streets of Paris and the self-centered, avaricious behavior of this family makes for wonderfully pointed comedy. In lesser hands this movie might come across as being pretentious and dull, but Malle can get to the heart of the matter very well and produces an excellent little comedy targeted at the sixties.

The English always called May "the lusty month" when every little whim whether wholesome or unwholesome comes into bloom ;the cold cabin fever of Winter is cast off and all senses are awakened......AND WATCH OUT!....anything goes!From France,Louis Malle has scripted a clever social satire about the upper-class Vieuzac family whose "May fever" turns into full blown upheaval when the family returns to their ancestral home when the matriarh of the family dies.The clan is indeed a most mixed bag of spoiled,greedy and "dysfunctional " characters who act out their "Tomfoolery" ,nearly destroying each other and everyone else around them,as they all march in to the decaying villa to dibby-up the goods and lay claim to their inheritance.All of the Vieuzacs' silliness plays out against the backdrop of the student revolution occuring in Paris at the same time.The two stories weave together in order to create some bizarre behaviour.The one character that fascinated me most was the little 11- year- old Francoise who is the near-silent observer of this entire situation.She observes,she asks questions,she is swept along and is a part of every piece of the action,yet remains detached and unchanged by it all.This movie is more wry and witty than hilarious and uproarious.The film is wonderfully subtitled in bold yellow subtitles making it extremely easy to follow.Though this film,with it's political backdrop is best understood by those who understand 1960's Europe, the theme of the Dysfunctional family is universal.
Some great companion films with similar themes would be DADDY's DYIN',WHO'S GOT THE WILL (USA),PIECES OF APRIL (USA),THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS (USA),THE FAMILY STONE (USA),THE CELEBRATION (France),A LOVING FATHER (France) and THE SEA (Iceland).