Courtesy of Lions Gate Films
The Dinner Game is a 1998 French comedy about a douchy Parisian publisher named Brochant (Timothy Lhermitte), who attends a weekly "dinner for idiots," at which other douchy people get together asnd invite idiots for their amusement, and the person who brings in the biggest idiot gets the top prize of the evening.
Brochant hooks up with Francois Pignon (Jacques Villeret), a tax man with an obsession for recreating famous landmarks with matchsticks. The Dinner Game posits that an easy way to spot an idiot is to find a person with a slightly strange area of expertise. Whether that be boomerang collecting or matchstick model making, apparently writer/director Francis Veber enjoys making fun of autistic people.
This movie has a cute set up in theory, but then they kinda blow the follow through. Before Brochant can take Pignon to the dinner, he injures his back and and never leaves his apartment. Pignon comes over to go to the dinner and instead he spends the evening bugging Brochant and destroying his life piece by piece (at least the pieces that Brochant finds most important). He screws up Brochant's reconciliation with his recently estranged wife and inadvertently gets Brochant audited by the most ruthless tax man in the game, which is sure to cost Brochant tons. And the movie ends without them leaving the apartment, and the great "dinner for idiots" set up does not pay off at all. Of course Brochant has an obvious "I was the idiot after all" epiphany, but he never eats dinner. The ruthless tax man gets to eat an omelette, but that's it.
Francis Veber adapted the movie from his own stage play, and as a result, 90% of the movie takes place in one location. This is fine for the theater, as it is incredibly difficult to keep switching scene locations live in front of an audience, night in and night out, but in a movie this merely becomes repetitious and boring. The Dinner Game movie and play were both big hits in France, but I doubt the non-payoff dinner and weak ending would not go over well with American offices. I was fairly surprised when the film ended in a sitcom-like freeze frame, and with the main problem of the story unresolved. Pignon, through a verbose burst of clear thinking, manages to reconcile Brochant with his wife. And almost immediately, through his buffoonery, he wrecks the reconciliation and boom! cut to freeze frame, roll credits, end movie.
In the end, The Dinner Game almost feels like a non-movie. Most of the conflict is not resolved so much as shunted aside, and the main promise of a dinner is not fulfilled. The recent remake Dinner for Schmucks at least had the dinner scene going for it. The Dinner Game is light on laughs and the best I can say is maybe something was lost in translation.
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