This is the story of few couples, mostly in their mid 40s that meet over a dinner. None really wants to go there because they fear it will be boring as a dead rat. Dany Boom is preparing the supper, a Polish traditional dish. He does not really know what to do with his life and eats antidepressant waiting for an inspiration. His wife is a successful lawyer and has an affair. All the different couples are not really happy with their relationships and find some fresh air in affairs.
You have as well the cancer specialist (Patriiiiiiiiiiiick Bruel) that is in love with his wife and he sees her moving away from him. He tells bad Jewish jokes at the dinner to mask his sadness. He is quite sad because of his job and the fact that he has to try to cure people that will not survive. I loved him because of some recent events and you really fill a lot of empathy for this character when you know some one close that went through this kind of misfortune.
You have the lawyer that married a nice looking lady but undermines her in everything she does to the point that she loses all self-confidence and spends a lot of time with a shrink to try to cure her depression. She has a hard comment at the dinner when she says that everybody is doing as if things were ok, as if they were healthy. Although she is too extreme, there are people that are just happy, it is nonetheless true that a lot of people are just unhappy with their lives. I am always amazed by the number of people that are lost in life. With the current economic crisis even more so. Common on it will be over one day or the other. Humankind is smart enough to solve self-inflicted pain!
Although the movie does not offer a lot of hope on the state of the couple today (it is amazing how easily people live a double life and cheat on the other) the two most depressed character are re-borned by love! At least the positive message lies in love!
In a nutshell this movie is well written, excellent actors, solid dialogues and a lot of excellent little episodes. The old father that fires his scorn on this generation that has turned ecological, vegetarian, moralist to the extreme and so judgemental without knowing what life really is... and in the end they are so unhappy! It was just a great moment of fun! He is not totally wrong in what he says!
