Just like the rest I was confused at the end, had many thoughts running through my mind... time travel!! wifes playing a prank, this guy has some serious mental issues..??? hoping the movie would not end without an explanation and to my surprise it did, well googled and found this is one of those movies.. read many reviews skimmed through the movie again and finally understood.. or i think... so here goes people, the first half is his dream!! all his thoughts played out very carefully... starts out with a simple dilemma on his moustache (identity>> does he understand himself well) lets leave the moustache out to understand better, the dilemma grows deeper with his doubts over his wife... is she being honest?? (theres even a scene in which she says she only says the truth, again his thoughts). The scene to the goddaughters birthday is his imagination considering his recent friends at the boat, what if they meet back in Paris. Brings in his office environment, confusion do people really know him there?, then the clown jacket where he imagines his wife picked it up for him, running off home to get the next flight hong kong to free himself from all the dilemma in his life >> well thats his vacation, thats how he imagined his vacation to have kicked off, freedom from his confused and stressed life. Reality starts when he's sitting in the boat with the red shirt, bearded and eating noodles...Post card incident is a trick a big trick, its shown him sitting in a hotel window writing to his wife, well if this takes place in his dreams then in reality while he is with his wife later after saying goodbye to their recent friends how could he have the card??? he then flicks it to the water.... thats confusing!!!well I agree with most other reviews the key is the hongkongs night lights reflecting from the water, its shown at the beginning then in the middle while he is dreaming and at the end....thus confirming its all his dream...

Because I'm about to tell you you've been had, like someone swindled by a two-bit fortune-teller.Before I explain why, let me start by saying that it did not bother me that this film didn't resolve itself. I've watched some pretty challenging and experimental films that leave a LOT hanging, and I love them! Try El Topo sometime. There are more mainstream ones too like Naked Lunch, or Brazil. These films do not have nice tidy plot lines where everything makes sense -- they are still brilliant films.The difference in the case of "La Moustache" is that while this film also happens to lack nice tidy plot lines, the film-makers seemed to think that that, all by itself, makes this film brilliant too.I have never before seen a film that was so elitist, so vapid, and so disrespectful of its audience in assuming it is more clever than they are. The really sad thing is that, judging from reviews here, and even many professional reviews, the film succeeded in pulling the wool over many peoples' eyes.Who the hell am I to say these things? Well I watched this film with a professional artist, and man with a PhD in comparative literature (who did extensive work in film studies). And you can probably tell from my writing, I'm no dummy either.And the three of us were in total agreement: This film is like an inside joke whose punch line doesn't make sense, and yet everyone, maybe for fear of appearing not to "get it" starts nodding and laughing nervously.Why is everyone doing this? Because the punch line SEEMS like it should make sense. We want it to make sense. There are all kinds of symbols and portentous happenings that are vaguely related to one another in some way or another -- like tarot cards sitting on the table. Stare at them long enough, and squint, and suddenly you can see "the answer".But your subconscious is really just inventing whatever story it likes, and omitting any details that didn't fit. The movie is not smarter than you are. It is a bunch of seemingly "deep" events that strut around like a Chinese emperor in his newest outfit. (Psst, he's naked!)As a film maker, if you're going to make a film that doesn't tie things together neatly, then you need to realize you have an obligation to make your film about SOMETHING more meaningful than the incongruous events you are showing on the screen.Naked lunch was about the visions of a writer who is losing his mind. Brazil was about how dreams are powerful enough to transcend even a post-apocalyptic nightmare of a future.This film is not about ANYTHING, except how you can make your audience follow a carrot on the end of a string, just by editing together a lot of scenes with great acting, great direction, and high production values that don't actually make any sense.It's apparently what happens when you take a neat starting idea (a man shaves off his mustache, and everyone seems not to notice, then they claim he never had one), and then you become more interested in making yourself look clever than in actually telling a story that bears some relevance on our lives.Very, very sad, or the French would say: Pathétique.

At first, through the first third of the movie, I was sure that the film was an allegory about the architect's family and friends never actually noticing him (or his moustache). Things got confusing to me when he didn't press his wife about the Bali photographs (which appear to confirm he's NOT crazy), his wife is apparently trying to have him committed and he suddenly escapes to Hong Kong.Though I did enjoy the film immensely in all its detail, I kept feeling there must have been a link between his moustache (and the identity crisis shaving it off led to) and his father's death. His father's death seemed to have discombobulated him.Did his own confusion about his moustache symbolize his inability to digest the death of his father? Was he dreaming all of the confusion about his moustache?In the end, I'm left with questions only. Nonetheless, I did enjoy this film and would like to know what other people think of it and what they make of it.

"La Moustache" is drawn from a novel penned by Emmanuel Carrère and this time, he chose to translate into pictures this mad story rather than letting seasoned filmmakers adapt it for the screen as it was previously the case (Claude Miller turned "la Classe De Neige", 1998 into a winner while "l'Adversaire", 2002 showed Nicole Garcia's wide skills as a female director). The question is: was it wise from Carrère to do himself the job? Because without being a total failure, his work is a very mixed one. Someone like Roman Polanski or Dominik Moll (the man responsible for "Harry Un Ami Qui Vous Veut Du Bien", 2000) would have been the man for the job.To surprise his wife (Emmanuelle Devos) and friends, Marc (Vincent Lindon) decides to shave his mustache and amazingly, no-one notices it. Worse, his wife goes to claim that he's never had a mustache. Who's right and wrong? How will things evolve from here? The material was promising and let predict a terrific eerie film. You can see what motivated Carrère to shoot his piece of work: an irrational, absurd feud of a couple for a trivial detail which causes its disintegration. If the mystery remains open until the very last pictures and by opting for a deliberately sparse cinematographic writing especially relying on gestures and looks rather than words, Carrère doesn't properly handle the unnerving climate such a bizarre story could convey and some key-sequences are unsatisfying, notably when Devos screams to her husband: "you have never had a mustache". The dramatic progression isn't really mastered to be convincingly taken in the absurd spiral that eats up the couple. Without mentioning a flimsy end from the moment when Marc flies to Hong Kong and roams there for a long time before landing in a lowly hotel. His spouse finds him back there. How could she know he was there?It's such an underwhelming menu that you don't want to think about it after the screening. Is Marc's wife right? Doesn't she play a shady game with her husband? What does she think of the evidence found by Marc where he can prove he's had a mustache? Actually, one doesn't bother about these questions. As for the actors, they have seen better days before and it's not a film they would put on top of their CVs.