Aristocrat: Baron, how did you find the English?
Baron: Droll. They have a way of speaking they call ''hew-mah.'' It makes them laugh enormously.
Aristocrat: Is it like wit?
Baron: Not really, no.
Aristocrat: What is it in French?
Baron: It's untranslatable.
Ponceludon: I had a strange dream. My head was on the block. The axman said-
Bellegarde: ''One quip and you can live.'' Everyone at court has that dream.
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| Ponceludon and Madame de Blayac. |
Ridicule is a French movie about a bunch of adult bullies all trying to get ahead with their "wit," clambering over each other to earn royal favor by out-barbing each other.
If it were all in good fun, that would be one thing, and having a good sense of humor is no crime, but this is nasty, cutthroat stuff. The ability to outwit one's neighbor in the court of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, as shown in the movie, was necessary in order to succeed, and meant the difference between wealth and poverty. This leads to cruelty and desperation. One man, who has been unsuccessfully trying to get the ear of the King, hangs himself in despair after a gag played on him pushes him over the edge.
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| Portrait of the real Louis XVI. |
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| Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. |
The movie opens with a rather shocking scene, when a man returns to visit a dying man who used to torment him and gets revenge by peeing on him: "Do you remember me? Think hard. Have I changed so much? Remember the ''Marquis de Stumblebum''? You dubbed me that when I fell at a ball. Stumblebum. So wounding! I never lived it down. Where is your fine wit now? All gone? What a loss for society. Since my exile I've seen many lands with far ruder manners. Yet I've never forgotten it." Fair warning: If you do not want to see a penis, do not watch this movie -he whips it right out to pee on that guy, and it sure took me by surprise.
Le Baron Grégoire Ponceludon de Malavoy (quite a mouthful) enters this venomous climate when he goes to Versailles to try to get help from the King. He needs funds to drain the swamps on his land to rid the area of the mosquitoes that are killing the peasants. Ponceludon cares a great deal about his people, and is determined that he will accomplish his goal, even if it means playing the vicious court games.
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| Ponceludon and Bellegarde. |
He receives advice and aid from a doctor, Le Marquis de Bellegarde, a friendly older man who appreciates Ponceludon's determination and talent: "Honesty and wit are so rarely combined." Bellgarde has a beautiful daughter, Mathilde, who is planning to marry a wealthy aristocrat she doesn't love in order to be able to continue her scientific studies. One of the grand dames of society, the conniving Madame de Blayac, alternately helps or hinders (or seduces) Ponceludon depending on her mood and circumstances.
In the end, Ponceludon can no longer stand to play the childish court games. When Mathilde breaks off her engagement out of love for him, he marries her and returns home with her to continue the struggle to drain the swamps through other means.
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| Mathilde and Ponceludon. |
There are some moments that feel very honest and sincere, such as when a group of supposedly "deaf and dumb" students prove that they have just as much wit as the courtiers with sign language, and when Ponceludon finally confronts the aristocrats about their immaturity: "Children will die tomorrow because you ridicule me today. You envy Voltaire's wit. He would have wept. He was ridiculously compassionate. Whose turn is next? Who gets lashed with wit so sharp his whole family reels? You? You, perhaps? Unless you get the chance to lash your neighbor first. Monsieur! Take off your mask! We all want to know who coined ''Marquis des Antipodes.'' I'm going back to my swamps where I belong. I'll build my canals and dikes. I'll dig mud with my bare hands."
It was actually a good movie, aside from the penis in the beginning.
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