C'est le bouquet! (2002) - Jeanne Labrune

One of these delightful little gems of the French cinema. Pokes fun at everything from the French revolution, Yuppies, Kieslowski to Clinton (Bill) via the Boston Brahmins. Politically incorrect to the hilt while remaining very correct by admonishing us for laughing at all the racist jokes. A lesson for anyone who wants to know how to make a romantic comedy. The dialogue is sparkling and the star cast delivers it well - the always excellent Jean-Pierre Darroussin coupled with the ravishing Sandrine Kiberlain, plus the old and the famous Jean-Claude Brialy and Maurice Bénichou. Add to this the dependables Dominique Blanc and Mathieu Amalric and what you have is nothing short of a casting coup. Vive la France! If you think the French version of 'Three men and a baby' was much better than the American one, then this is the film for you. I had never heard of Jeanne Labrune (the director), but she is definitely worth the discovery.

Uranus (1990) - Claude Berri

Post-war France at its best and worst - the communists trying to prove their patriotism by catching collaborators, everyone trying to prove their innocence with someone else's guilt, with the inevitable results - some innocents are punished and some guilty remain unpunished but not very happy either. A very theatrical production featuring some of the greatest contemporary French actors: Gérard Depardieu as a touching bar owner who is passionate about alcohol and Racine, in that order, Philippe Noiret as a cynical but happy professor, Michel Blanc as a level-headed but headstrong communist, Michel Galabru as a war profiteer, and Jean-Pierre Marielle as a Petainist with a guilt conscience. As a bonus, a very young Fabrice Luchini plays a communist from a bourgeois background and the baggage that comes with it. All in all, the kind of Cinema of Quality that Truffaut and his fellow new wave directors abhorred, but that thrives in France and is popular the world over. A kind of Merchant-Ivory production in the French tradition.