Un drôle de colonel (1968) User Reviews

"India, what a wonderful country !"

[myriamlenys · 3/10 · 17 January 2023]

Two mediocre jewel thieves constantly find themselves outwitted by a more intelligent criminal known as "The Angel". The Angel likes playing cat-and-mouse games with them : for instance, he sends one of them a magnificent cake as a birthday surprise. This calls for revenge. Following the trail of their nemesis, the two mediocre thieves arrive at a large villa that belongs to a British expert on Indian culture...

"Un drôle de colonel" is a farce. Needless to say, it comes with a number of age-old conventions proper to the genre : mistaken identities, unexpected visitors, disguises, fake moustaches, silly accents and so on. In spite of its excellent cast it's not particularly funny. (Still, there's a rather funny feminist twist at the end.) One gets the feeling that the various actors bravely tried to make the best of it, while knowing that they were appearing in a work destined to sink under the waves. An exception is the deeply miscast Jean Yanne, who seems to have given up entirely and just spends most of his time screaming and barking.

"Un drôle de colonel" is set in Great-Britain, which is rather strange considering that both the cast and the acting style are unmistakably Gallic. Surely it would have been a piece of cake to tell a tale not about a British colonel who's a specialist on India, but about a French colonel who's a specialist on Algeria, Madagascar or Indochina ? The costumes too are confusing. Are we talking about the 1930's or the 1960's ?

So no, I don't recommend the movie, since it represents a sad waste of comedic talent. Viewers who would like to see Maria Pacôme in a better comedy can watch "Le distrait". Her delirious "gazoo gazoo" scenes with Bernard Blier have become the stuff of legend.

"Another French comedy"!

[RodrigAndrisan · 1/10 · 31 August 2021]

It will be difficult to laugh seeing this one too, it's only a little bit funny, just try and you will convince yourself, well, if you are patient enough to see the whole movie.

There are some very very good actors in the cast such as Michel Galabru, Jean Yanne, Maria Pacôme, Jean Le Poulain, but the script is weak and, despite their immense talent, they don't succeed much, they repeat themselves in everything they do. Jean Lefebvre, I never considered him a funny actor, I saw him in many "French comedies", he never made me laugh.

With the Angel's compliments.

[dbdumonteil · 4 October 2018]

Although it is not based on a play ,the action seems to take place on a stage ,where the actors appear now and then to do their little number;Jean Girault was not much of a director and by and large ,he leaves his cast to their own devices ;here he hired two comedians of his Gendarmes saga ,Jean Lefèvre and Michel Galabru ,plus some usual suspects such as Jean Yanne and Maria Pacôme .

A pair of thieves sees a mysterious crook ,"the Angel " pull the rug under their feet ;every time they plan a robbery, their rival has just come before and let them his card which reads "with the Angel's compliments".The "boss" and his idiot sidekick want to avenge themselves;they know that their enemy has stolen a precious stone and concealed it in a colonel's mansion ;so they kidnap the military man (just back from India) and take his place to be able to search the house .But a lot of unexpected intruders come to the house ,including the (true) colonel's fiancé .

If you are not too demanding ,there are some funny elements: Lefèvre using a carafe stopper to have Marina (Pascale Roberts)do a private strip-tease;the same disguised as a Hindu ,inventing "proverbs " and invoking Khali's curse ;plus a welcome whodunit: the Angel must be among those people who impose themselves in the mansion.

Why did they locate the story in London where everybody's supposed to speak English and absolutely nobody does ?Probably because there are no colonels fighting in India in Girault's native land.