Three major R, four minor ones and three exclamation marks, this is the (so) unconventional title of the "Robin des Bois" movie, the first one
and in a sense of poetic justice, the last one, too.
Would you be surprised? This is not the kind of film you 'review', this is the film you warn people about not watching it. But I doubt there are still people in this planet having this on their watch list. Well, I'll save you time, watch the 'other film', whatever it is, it might at least try to tell a story, or to awaken some emotion. That prehistoric thing, doesn't even deserve to be called a movie, it's not even so-bad-it's-good, it's not even so absurd it's funny
at least, not if you intend to watch the whole movie at once because the longer you stare at the screen, the less you understand what's going on.
Anyway, the first time I saw it, a quarter had passed before my mind was in autopilot mode, somewhere I was wondering whether I was missing something or not. Was there an attempt at a plot or have I been dumbed down. The story is about a prehistoric tribe, the Clean Hair. They live during Stone Age, and guess what? They're all called 'Stone' (Pierre in France) a passable gag whose only brilliance is that they had to build the whole character-naming on that. There's a rivalry opposing them to the other tribe, the Dirty Hair who wants their secret to have clean hair. The story also involves a murder, the first 'crime' to be committed as in Tex Avery's "First Bad Man" cartoon.
That's it, these could have been interesting premises, these are just crumbs on the scale of the film's length. Yes, there are some funny moments but most of the time, the characters wonder and exchange words that doesn't work even on the basis that they're ad-libbed. It's so blatant that I doubt the actors could endure their own movie if they had to. I stopped watching it the first time, the second, after twenty minutes, I was on IMDb with the sound left on, just in case I would hear something interesting. But take my word for it, no matter what you do, it will be more precious than watching this film, even staring at a blank screen.
The film had one merit though: it put an end to the previously harmonious marriage between TV and Cinema humor. TV incarnated with the 'Canal+' channel. Founded in 1984, 'Canal' paved the way to a great generation of comedians: from Coluche to Jamel Debbouze. In 1994, the most emblematic alumni of Canal+, "Les Nuls" troop made a great crime thriller parody named "City of Fear", it was a success and made a star out of Alain Chabat, the leader. Many comedies would follow, and Chabat would be the king of French box-office with his "Asterix : Mission Cleopatra", 14 millions of viewers, the second highest-grossing French film at the time. In 2004, his "RRRrrrr!!!" would attract 1,7 million viewers, a great start spoiled by a bad word-of-mouth.
And there's no excuse for that. While Chabat directed his 'Asterix' with the heart of a fan, in this mess, he let the control to the 'Robin des Bois' . A few words about them, the Robin des Bois were a group of comedians specialized in a form of awkward geek-humor oscillating between Monty Python and Andy Kauffman, in the five-minute format, they were hilarious, but in the movie, they're just incomprehensible. It seems like the film wasn't even prepared, as if the comedians were brainstorming five minutes before they hear 'action' and they instinctively believed that whatever would make them laugh, would translate well in the theater, a proof, if needed that even a comedy can be 'pretentious'.
It's not the first time, comedians make a film for the big screen: in the 70's, it was the Splendid troop but their director was an outsider who could have an external view and make them leave their comfort zone. "RRRrrrr!!!" is the product of people who, unfortunately, took their popularity for granted. Chabat lost his magic touch and the Robin des Bois would follow different paths, the more versatile Jean-Paule Rouve had the most successful career so far. Finally the dreadful adaptation of "Lucky Luke" would hit the final nail on the coffin. It was the end of an era started in 1994.
That's what you get with empty plots, a few cameos (Depardieu again and even jean Rochefort indulge to this ugly-looking cinematic mess) and a huge marketing publicity. The only justice is that the film was a flop and there's nothing more to say about it, except that it's crrrrrrap with more 'r' than the title, which I think refers to the sound of people groaning at the abysmal non-sense they're watching. It deserves a "1" according to IMDb standards, but you know what, I give it a 3, and you know why? Because of the first gag.
The first gag has to be one of the most hilarious opening voice-overs to any film. Since I told you, not to watch the film, I'd feel hypocritical not to spoil the opening. So here it is; with a war-sounding noises in the background, on a black screen, the narrator presents the story of a 1969 Vietnam troop that had a routine mission but ended up being caught by the Vietcong for a ferocious battle. It ends with "This film doesn't tell their story". A laugh-riot, it's all downhill after.
But it seems that this gag was so great it drained out the authors' creativity, a pity because if the rest of the movie was 10% as funny as this gag, with a 'conventional' story within an unconventional tone, it might have worked. Instead, it's a waste of talents that will waste your time.
