Qu’est-ce qu’on a fait au Bon Dieu?
Director: Philippe de Chauveron
Writer: Philippe de Chauveron, Guy Laurent
Cast: Christian Clavier, Chantal Lauby, Julia Piaton, Ary Abittan, Frédérique Bel, Medi Sadoun, Emilie Caen, Frédéric Chau, Elodie Fontan, Noom Diawara

Plot:
The Verneuils (Christian Clavier, Chantal Lauby) are rich, conservative and catholic, so it comes as no surprise that when the first three of their four daughters (Julia Piaton, Frédérique Bel, Emilie Caen) marry somebody with Jewish (Ary Abittan), somebody with Arab (Medi Sadoun) and somebody with Chinese roots (Frédéric Chau) respectively they have trouble coping with their suddenly multiethnic family. Secretely their hopes are on their youngest daughter (Elodie Fontan) to marry a catholic guy. Which she actually wants to do. Only that her choice is a black guy (Noom Diawara).

I was unsure whether I wanted to see this film. I was afraid that it would traipse through every cliche ever, making their racially loaded jokes and think that it would be okay by proclaiming in the end that they all love each other and everybody has learned now to be tolerant. Despite those issues actually being there, they weren’t quite as bad as I feared. But the film wasn’t great either.

Honestly, it’s hard to put into words why the film wasn’t that great at depicting racial issues despite it’s good intentions. I understand that a catholic, conservative couple would have issues with their daughters marrying outside of catholic, white, conservative circles. And it’s nice to have a film that addresses the implicit racism that is there even when people mean well. It’s certainly important to talk about how saying “Jews are great with money” is already racist.

But that’s not really what the film does. It does make fun of the Jewish son-in-law for not being good with money, but their explanation for that isn’t that it’s a stupid stereotype, but that the world has changed and now it’s the Chinese who are good with money. Get with the program, hire a Chinese guy to do your finances and everything will be fine. That means that the stereotypes are not so much questioned but transferred and replaced by other stereotypes.
Or when they talk about the issue of circumcision and the Jewish guy explains that they do it this early because the nervous system of the child isn’t completely developed at that point so they don’t feel the circumcision (which is factually wrong) and the real barbarism is the way Muslims do it – by waiting until the kids are older. And in the end that claim is pretty much left undisputed, practically forcing you to side with the catholic parents’ disgust at the tradition. [Much can be said on the topic of circumcision, but certainly not like this.]

And apart from these moments where the film just fails to enact its supposed message of tolerance and acceptance, it’s pretty horrible with the women. First of all, the fact alone that the set-up thought it necessary that they had four daughters (because a man marrying somebody “exotic” is ok, or at worst a little eccentric, but the pure white daughters really need protecting from those dirty foreigners) is extremely problematic. That all those daughters appear to be the same age and have practically no personality to distinguish them from each other (one is an artist and therefore automatically emotionally volatile) doesn’t make things better. At least the guys get to be different because they’re different stereotypes. And that the mother is entirely appeased, after a small period of shock, when she gets a catholic wedding (or at least that’s enough to make her look for help from a psychologist) and generally the women aren’t really racist and just shake their heads at the pig-headed men, is just the straw to break the camel’s back.

The movie was entertaining and they often managed to find their way back from the worst parts. There were some more insightful moments, some genuine laughter even and the various son-in-laws certainly aren’t hard on the eyes (neither are the daughters). There were only a few moments where I outright cringed and the rest of the time, it was enjoyable to watch. But there was a certain uneasiness that never left me.

Summarizing: maybe. I don’t know. I’m still unsure. Maybe I’m totally overreacting. If you don’t expect too much, it could be good.

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I would love to hear from somebody who is actually part of any of those minority groups, if they were as uncomfortable as me. So if somebody knows of anybody having written an article about it, let me know!