OSS 117 is one of the funniest movies ever made. The moment Jean Dujardin comes on screen at the beginning you are just laughing. The entire movie is just fun to sit through, it is light and silly and outrageously entertaining.
Dujardin is Hubert Bonisseur de la Bath a French intelligence officer known as OSS 117. He has just learned that his former partner Jack Jefferson has been killed on assignment in Cairo. Before Jack was killed he was looking into the disappearance of a ship carrying arms. Now Hubert has to find the ship while at the same time try to bring peace to the Middle East.
His contact in Cairo is a beautiful woman named Larmina (Berenice Bejo). He falls for her pretty quickly but just like in any spy story she starts off cold, seems to be the bad guy, then turns out to be good and the spy loves her even more.
This is where I stop telling you about the plot because it is way too funny to spoil. The whole movie is a spoof of the James Bond movies or any spy movie of the 1950s. Every aspect of those films is completely exaggerated here like the phony fighting, the gorgeous lady who has several different motives, the bad guys, how the good guy can escape from every situation, and how fast the good guy learns about his surroundings.
I cracked up with how ignorant Hubert was made to be! Oh my god he was so bad! Larmina told him she could not have a drink because she is Muslim and it is against her religion to have alcohol, he tells her he will tire of the religion one day. The Muslims have their call to prayer early in the morning and they are said by someone from a minaret. Hubert had no idea what the guy was doing, he got out of bed, went to the minaret and beat the guy up to stop! These are just some of the ignorant things Hubert does that I was laughing so hard with. Hubert’s ignorance is one of the hundreds of things that make this movie hysterical.
Jean Dujardin is a panic. He was perfect as this stereotypical 1950s French spy. Pretty much any time he did something or said something you are left laughing. Berenice Bejo as Larmina was so damn adorable. In one scene she gets stuck in a Nazis hideout in the pyramids and they think they will never be able to get out and they will rot so she starts freaking out getting all over dramatic. In the middle of her freak out Hubert finds the switch. Dujardin and Bejo have such amazing chemistry together. They could make movies together forever and I would see every single one of them without ever getting tired of seeing them together.
OSS 117 is one of the funniest comedies movies I have ever seen and one of the best French movies I have seen. This was a spoof movie in the style of Mel Brooks where the comedy was subtle and not over the top and just exaggerated everything. Michel Hazanavicious made an incredible comedy. OSS117 is a comedy I can easily watch over and over again and show everyone I know.