hyped garbage

Crappy film

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

The two movies came in 1993 and if each one was a huge success, the two split totally in vision and production. This one is about what France does best, comedy and its long history! Usually, time travel is about going into the past and causing paradox while here it's about going into the future which is our present! A bit like "BTF", our heroes feel stuck and alien to their new environment and want to get back to their time-line. But the essential factors here are not the special effects that are rather crude but the cast and the idea to stick to country life that remains even today the real roots of France! Lemercier who isn't among the glamorous one is indeed exceptional as a catholic housewife of this rural elite! And for sure, for all who like French history, the meeting of old language and new speech is totally funny whereas we rather expected the same gap with the objects… So this comedy really embodies what's my country and is thus a must-see for all France lovers!

I'm French and still found this film irritating more than funny. People laud it's stupidity, believe me I like loads of stupid films but this did not make me laugh single time. All the actors are screaming non stop, suppose to speak ancient french but do lots of terrible play on words or ridiculous deformations of modern french words. There's loads of explosions or things being broken for a supposedly comic effect, easy visual jokes or jokes about contrast of Middle Ages buffoons misunderstanding everything modern, bad jokes and clichés about "modern" aristocracy, insulting clichés about the province. It had a great comedy potential but nothing ends up being funny unless you're 2 years old or a chimpanzee. It's a film made for stupid people by a bunch of actors that became rich and despise the poor. Completely despicable .

I guess the main thing to be said about "les Visiteurs" is that it hardly makes sense for a non-French-speaking audience to watch it. I shudder to think what it sounds like dubbed, for instance. Plus the elements of French satire are probably not transposable elsewhere.I laughed to tears when I viewed "les Visiteurs" when it was released in France 15 years ago, where it was an immediate box-office hit. Now I must admit it mostly brings a smile there and there. Of course it's me being 15 years older but the movie just hasn't aged well. The directing is mediocre at best, the cheap CGI is horrendous, and Marie-Anne Chazel's character as a tramp grates on one's nerves. There still remains the altogether funny plot, the hilarious performances by Reno, Clavier and Lemercier, as well as the (then) cult dialogs.Watcheable if you like French comedies, but don't get your hopes too high. In the same vein "Les Bronzés" (part I & II) is far superior. And incidentally Les Visiteurs part II was embarrassingly bad.

I once commented rather unflatteringly on a film featuring French comedian Louis de Funes a few years ago, and I believe it is one of the least 'useful' comments I have written. Something like 0 out of 19, I think. When it comes to French humour I clearly don't 'get' it, because this successful comedy also left me cold.It begins promisingly, and the scenes featuring Jean Reno's Godefrey de Papincourt and Christian Clavier's Jacquard in their own time are by far the funniest and strongest. Unfortunately, things descend into a typically Gallic farce when they unexpectedly find themselves transported to modern-day France. It's surprising, really, because you'd think the potential for laughs from this 'fish out of water' scenario would be virtually inexhaustible. In this case, however, they're practically invisible. The hapless knight and his serf drink water from the toilet and leave the basin taps running, they pull light fittings from the wall believing them to be torches (one of the funnier moments) and get travel sickness in cars.Jean Reno has a face made for comedy – although this is the first one I can remember seeing him in and he provides most of the laughs. Clavier's brand of humour is too broad (he also co-wrote) and he is too prone to pulling faces to get laughs. Many of the other characters are simply annoying; they either do stupid things or stand around screeching at what Reno and Clavier are doing. Clavier plays two roles, and it's a toss up as to which is the least funny.Other reviewers have suggested that much of the humour will be lost if you need to rely on subtitles to understand what is being said. While this may be true, it can't account for the number of visual gags that fall flat.