Product Details

• Actors: Daniel Auteuil, Dany Boon, Julie Gayet, Julie Durand, Jacques Mathou
• Directors: Patrice Leconte
• Writers: Patrice Leconte, Jérôme Tonnerre, Olivier Dazat
• Producers: Eric Jehelmann, Marc Missonnier, Olivier Delbosc
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: French
• Subtitles: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Studio: Ifc
• DVD Release Date: October 16, 2007
• Run Time: 94 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (33 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000UAE7MM
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #54,946 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "My Best Friend" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

Catherine (Gayet), refuses to believe that her business partner, the unlikeable François (Auteuil), has a best friend, so she challenges him to set up an introduction. Scrambling to find someone willing to pose as his best pal, François enlists the services of a charming taxi driver (Boon) to play the part.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

66 of 68 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Mon meilleur film!, September 1, 2007

By 

Jean E. Pouliot (Newburyport, MA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: My Best Friend (DVD)

"My Best Friend" could have been maudlin (in the hands of a less talented foreign director) or irritatingly over-the top (in he hands of a less talented American director. Instead it is a believable and charming look at friendship in the 21st century, and the lengths to which some will go to get it.

Francois Coste (Daniel Auteuil) is a Parisian dealer in Art Deco antiques. He is completely focused on his business, and on the accumulation of goods. Evidently, this monomania has come at the expense of family, friendships and business ethics - has gained him the notoriety of being a man who has no friends. At a restaurant gathering on his birthday, his associates tell him bluntly that when he dies, there will be exactly zero people at his funeral. Coste can't accept this and claims to have many friends. He is challenged by his business partner (whose sexual preference he does not even know) to prove this. He has 10 days to prove that he is not totally bereft of friends.

Bruno Bouley (Balanchine in the English version) is a voluble and warmhearted taxi driver - the kind who rattles off historical details as he drives his fares around town. Bouley has tried to make his talent pay off by appearing on French TV game shows, but his extreme nervousness keeps him from being chosen as a contestant.

One day, these two meet, and after a certain amount of skittishness, Costes decides that this hyper-extraverted cab driver could be his ticket to winning his bet. He engages him to teach him to be friendly.

The film could have taken many paths, but trod one of believability and pathos. Auteuil played Costes marvelously as a man who is seemingly pleasant outwardly, but whose actions, though not evil or outrageous in themselves, pile on one another over time to revealed a character who was toxic and uncaring. Boon played Bouley as the classic lost soul - talented, sensitive and warm - who could neither capitalize on his skill nor find solace among his own acquaintances.

"My Best Friend" is engaging, real, funny and often poignant. The plot line is tight, providing plausible limits and rationales for character actions. There is smart use of a Greek vase depicting the friendship of Achilles and Patroclus -- an object that becomes the unexpected focus of Costes's attention and a key element in the film. The emotional heat of "My Best Friend" is always set on low. But like Costes's many business acquaintances, viewers will find themselves pulling for him, hoping that he will find it in himself to be less "détestable" - another French word that needs no translation - and more "sympathique" or likable - a quality that Costes sought throughout this wonderful film.

60 of 63 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars From director Patrice Leconte and actor Daniel Auteuil, a sweet-natured film about friendship, August 19, 2007

By 

C. O. DeRiemer (San Antonio, Texas, USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: My Best Friend (DVD)

Oh no, not another winsome human comedy about life-lessons and friendship. Buy a movie ticket or the DVD anyway. In the hands of director Patrice Leconte and actors Daniel Auteuil and Dany Boon, My Best Friend turns out to be not just a charming, sweet-natured fable, but a well-told and well-acted one. Francois Coste (Auteuil) co-owns a Paris gallery, has a great-looking apartment, seems estranged from his college-going daughter, knows many people in the business and has just impulsively bought at auction a very expensive Greek vase. One thing Coste lacks are any friends. Oh, he has plenty of business acquaintances, is reasonably cordial most of the time, but also, we notice, is somewhat distant to everyone he knows. He can talk antiques engagingly but he doesn't seem to really notice much about the people he talks to. When he gets in over his head financially with the purchase of the vase, his smart, good-looking partner is irritated. Francois has never even noticed that she likes women and has a partner of her own. She makes a bet with him. He has ten days to prove he has a best friend...or she gets the vase. Francois is smugly confident, until the people he adds to his list of friends begin telling him the truth. And then he meets a cabdriver, Bruno Bouley (Boon). Bruno likes people, listens to them, talks to them and has a great passion for odd facts. He wants to be on a television quiz program. People seem naturally to like Bruno. When Francois realizes he has no friends, real friends, the kind you can call up at 3 a.m. or who will do whatever it takes to come to your assistance if you need help, he decides to have Bruno teach him how to make friends. It doesn't work out quite the way Francois expects, or the way we expect, at least not till the very end of the movie.

Sweet-natured the movie is. Both Francois and Bruno learn some lessons that hurt, Bruno first and then Francois. That the story eventually works out for all concerned is no spoiler. We've smiled some, teared up a little, and left the movie house feeling well pleased and satisfied. We also ask ourselves, this is a Patrice Leconte film, from the man who has given us such exceptional movies as Mr. Hire (1989), Man on the Train (2002), Ridicule 1996) and The Widow of Saint-Pierre (2000)? It is, and My Best Friend is an amusing vacation from angst and irony and drama. It's a thoroughly enjoyable movie.

The two actors who make it work so well, of course, are Auteuil and Boon. They play off each other with great skill and authenticity. Auteuil is practically a French national treasure. Along with his contemporary Gerard Depardieu, the two have just about dominated French acting by male leads. Neither of them has conventional leading man looks, but both can play anything, from tragedy to comedy, from fools to heroes, and both can either dominate a movie or fade back into being one of the cast. Compare the versatility of Auteuil: Contemporary high drama in Cache (2005) and La Separation (1994), rollicking sword-play and romance in Le Bossu (1997), tragedy in The Widow of Saint Pierre (1994) and hopeless, dull-witted ineptitude in Jean de Florette and, especially, Manon of the Spring (both 1986).

Mon Meilleur Ami is an easy-going, charming movie about friendship and even love. "There is no love, just the tests for love;" no, "There are no tests for love, just love." Both make sense. That's why this movie works.
Le Bossu [Region 2]
Cache (Hidden)
The Widow of Saint-Pierre
La Separation
Jean De Florette / Manon of the Spring (MGM World Films)

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars François and Bruno: the French Odd Couple., October 3, 2007

By 

G. Merritt (Boulder, CO) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: My Best Friend (DVD)

Directed by Patrice Leconte (Monsieur Hire, Intimate Strangers), My Best Friend (Mon Meilleur Ami) stars one of my favorite French actors, Daniel Auteuil, as François, a smug Parisian antiques dealer, who one day realizes that he has no friends. In fact, his co-workers, business associates, and family members all clearly despise him, and bluntly confess as much during his birthday party. (You may remember Auteuil from his fine performances in Jean De Florette / Manon of the Spring, Cache (Hidden), Un Coeur en Hiver ( A Heart in Winter ), La Separation, and Lucie Aubrac.) After betting his lesbian business partner (Julie Gayet) that he will produce a best friend within 10 days, François sets out to find one. His search goes badly. Eventually he meets his complete opposite, a lovable, big-hearted, trivia-obsessed, chattering, Paris cabdriver, Bruno (Danny Boon), resulting in a Gallic Odd Couple. Like Felix and Oscar, these men need each other. Both Auteuil and Boon bring captivating performances to this otherwise formulaic, no-real-surprises, buddy comedy. I'm predicting a Hollywood remake possibly starring Alec Baldwin or John Malkovitch as François and Adam Sandler as Bruno.

G. Merritt