Rich bigoted businessman Victor Pivert (Louis de Funès) is also on his way; his daughter (Miou-Miou) will be married the next day. Pivert is a dreadful man: bad-tempered, rude and a bigot, with a well-honed racism against blacks, Jews, and pretty much all foreigners. He and his driver, Salomon (Henri Guybet), have a car accident in which Pivert's car (carrying a speed boat) flips upside-down into a lake. When Salomon, who is Jewish, refuses to help because Shabbat has just begun, Pivert fires him, much to Salomon's content. Arab revolulutionary leader Mohamed Larbi Slimane (Claude Giraud) is kidnapped by killers who are working for his country's government. The team, led by Colonel Farès, takes him by night to an empty bubble gum factory... the same place where Victor Pivert goes to find assistance. Pivert involuntarily helps Slimane to flee, leaving two killers' corpses behind them. The police, alerted by Salomon, find the bodies and accuse Pivert of the crime. Which forces them to stick together going to ludicrous extremes to stay ahead of the killers including stealing the identity of visiting American Rabbi Jacob (Marcel Dalio).
A 1973 Franco-Italian production, the movie is a vehicle for Louis de Funès, a french comedian known for his high energy near pantomime style as well as his very expressive face. Louis de Funès was very popular during the 60s and 70s in Europe, and The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob was an experiment to see if he could reach a broader audience by adding American characters and settings (albeit very brief) and even securing distribution by 20th Century Fox. The movie didn't really lead to any long lasting foothold in the United States for de Funès, but has found an appreciation among a loyal following. While I like parts of the movie, it's a very uneven movie where some elements work better than others.
Despite the movie touting the whole "Rabbi Jacob" element of the movie, it really only encompasses the latter half of the movie, even Rabbi Jacob spends a large amount of time off camera with as much as half hour stretches going by where we see hide nor hair of him. The movie for the most part focuses on de Funès' Victor Pivert, a bigoted business man who through a comedy of errors finds himself stranded in the French countryside where he finds himself unintentionally stumbling into a plot of Assassins from a Middle Eastern nation (never named in the movie, but supposedly Iran) trying to assassinate a revolutionary leader in exile. It's honestly a solid premise for a comedy and there are some well done gags involving major set pieces at a bubblegum factory, airport, and a Jewish community, while de Funès is funny in the movie, he also has a tendency to overdo gags and essentially and bring in pantomime and mugging when the situation really spoke for itself.
De Funès take on Victor Pivert is simultaneously really good and really bad, while he does sell the jackass businessman we love to hate and see taken down a peg, his tendency to go into miming, mugging, and making silly sound effects don't fit the character he's playing and just feel at odds with the rest of the movie. It's not a comic killer like I've seen in some comedy performances, but he really should've dialed back the odd mannerisms in my opinion. With that said de Funès does do some very funny stunts and visual gags including a scene involving a luggage conveyor belt that is well staged and for the most part the ratio of jokes is more hits than misses.
The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob is a good farcical comedy with tight pacing and strong gags. It does occasionally undermine itself with overuse of mugging and pantomime for humor, but overall it's a decent showcase for de Funès' talents and a good comedy overall.
A 1973 Franco-Italian production, the movie is a vehicle for Louis de Funès, a french comedian known for his high energy near pantomime style as well as his very expressive face. Louis de Funès was very popular during the 60s and 70s in Europe, and The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob was an experiment to see if he could reach a broader audience by adding American characters and settings (albeit very brief) and even securing distribution by 20th Century Fox. The movie didn't really lead to any long lasting foothold in the United States for de Funès, but has found an appreciation among a loyal following. While I like parts of the movie, it's a very uneven movie where some elements work better than others.
Despite the movie touting the whole "Rabbi Jacob" element of the movie, it really only encompasses the latter half of the movie, even Rabbi Jacob spends a large amount of time off camera with as much as half hour stretches going by where we see hide nor hair of him. The movie for the most part focuses on de Funès' Victor Pivert, a bigoted business man who through a comedy of errors finds himself stranded in the French countryside where he finds himself unintentionally stumbling into a plot of Assassins from a Middle Eastern nation (never named in the movie, but supposedly Iran) trying to assassinate a revolutionary leader in exile. It's honestly a solid premise for a comedy and there are some well done gags involving major set pieces at a bubblegum factory, airport, and a Jewish community, while de Funès is funny in the movie, he also has a tendency to overdo gags and essentially and bring in pantomime and mugging when the situation really spoke for itself.
De Funès take on Victor Pivert is simultaneously really good and really bad, while he does sell the jackass businessman we love to hate and see taken down a peg, his tendency to go into miming, mugging, and making silly sound effects don't fit the character he's playing and just feel at odds with the rest of the movie. It's not a comic killer like I've seen in some comedy performances, but he really should've dialed back the odd mannerisms in my opinion. With that said de Funès does do some very funny stunts and visual gags including a scene involving a luggage conveyor belt that is well staged and for the most part the ratio of jokes is more hits than misses.
The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob is a good farcical comedy with tight pacing and strong gags. It does occasionally undermine itself with overuse of mugging and pantomime for humor, but overall it's a decent showcase for de Funès' talents and a good comedy overall.