French-language comedy abounds with the sort of film that makes perfect sense while you're watching it, but cannot be recounted to anyone who hasn't seen it without realising that...um...it's totally mad. "La Fée" is one of these. Part of its success is the fact that while the situations are farcical in the extreme, the actors carry them out totally deadpan, in the style of Buster Keaton. It's "normal" in their world, so you accept it as normal. Once you can accept the basic premise (sad little night clerk encounters a fairy who offers him three wishes), you are drawn into their version of reality, and no matter how mad it gets you just keep going, wondering where it will all end up. The actors are excellent, sending up silent films, musical comedies and rom-coms in the most ludicrous way without telegraphing (as so many American and English actors would), "Okay, get ready to laugh, funny bit coming up!" No, they just do what they do, and you find yourself giggling with astonishment. The hospital system comes in for its share of sendups (from the "smoking area" to the staff-of-one who manages to keep everything under control...to a point), the national obsession with rugby, etc. You do have to be aware or many of the more obscure bits of "business" will be lost. I think Keaton and Lloyd would have enjoyed this film very much. If it had a weakness, it was in the non-end; the director simply stopped filming when he was done, without attempting to tie it all up in a nice, bland little package. "La Fée" reminded me strongly of "L'Iceberg". When I checked IMDb I realised it was made by the same people.

So God created a fairy but before the fairy has much of a chance to learn the ropes, the world locks her up in an asylum. But the fairy escapes and comes to the gentle, lonely hotel night clerk. She grants him wishes, she saves him from choking on his midnight snack, she brings a giving, almost motherly kind of love into his life. That's the bones of this beautiful love story and if you like love stories, please see it. As to the details, there are many laughs. I'm a big Tati fan and his influence is all over this film. But the sight gags as well the the movement in general are much more pronounced than what you find in 'Mr. Hulot's Holiday' or 'Mon Oncle'. Where Tati is for smiles, 'The Fairy' is for laughs. Fiona Gordon, who plays the fairy (she also co-wrote and co-directed the movie with her husband, Dom Abel) is all over the place with her gangley arms and legs. Sometimes she looks like a gooney bird trying to take flight. And she has the kind of homely face that translates to transcendent beauty. The dance numbers are wonderful. This is modern dance without that deadening seriousness about itself that you see too much of on public TV. Some reviewers have stated that some of the gags fall flat. That might happen if you don't let Fiona and Dom borrow your heart. Lend them your heart and the obvious intent of this wonderful film -- to make you happy -- will be fulfilled.

Although this film contains one of the best images I have ever seen in a film ( the tug of war contest over our lovers embracing) the humour was cartoonish tom-foolery. The audience quickly grew tired at being told when to laugh; all that was missing was a drum roll and symbol crash.The audience was left cringing in pro- longed,embarrassed silence. It seemed every bit- actor wanted the camera's attention for as long as possible adding to the squirm in the seat factor. Our lovers were more like elongated, gangly ,naive siblings. Pointless sub-plots add to the surreal feel of the film. There were lots of nods to the silent era ( our heroes are mime artists, so not fully surprising) but there was no mastery of subtlety- unlike Le Havre. Sweet but full of eye-rollingly excruciating moments.

To tell the truth, I only saw the second half of this film. It was on cable TV and I flicked onto it. I almost turned it off straight away, but while my finger was hovering over the button I found, to my surprise, that I was smiling; and then, to my even greater surprise, I laughed out loud.I'm not generally a fan of French comedies. Far to many of them seem to think that it's funny to watch people shouting at each other as a result of some ridiculous misunderstanding. But occasionally there's one that's less aggressive, more subtle, and this is one of them. "Subtle" is probably not a word that would normally be used to describe the purely visual and physical humour of this film, but for me there was subtlety in the way the physical contortions of the two lead characters were performed without flamboyance or theatricality, and used to create situations that were totally unexpected.Although not generally a fan of French comedies, I am certainly a fan of French cinema in general. One of the reasons for that is its ability to produce the occasional offbeat gem, like this one. It's funny, it's innocent and it's warm-hearted. I liked it a lot.