Spirou was a huge star of the comic strip and a simple red calot is enough to evoke this bellhop fighting the infamous Zorglub alongside Fantasio, ridiculous journalist and milk soup, which will also mark the debut of Gaston Lagaffe and Spip, his famous squirrel. So famous that he even had a youth newspaper in his name, where Boule et Bill, the Smurfs and Gaston Lagaffe appeared, whom we have already met in the cinema in recent years (or that we will meet for the last one). So why Spirou and Fantasio?
One thing needs to be thought about. It's about adapting a children's comic. But the youth of amateurs has already passed a few decades, the character being little known today. The question is: how to make today's young people love the dream of the young people of the 1960s?
Successful formal adaptation
Alexandre Coffre has attempted with Spirou and Fantasio a rather convincing adaptation work in his choice of sets and actors. The latter are particularly well chosen. Even if Clavier does not play an extremely convincing Champignac, what a pleasure to see him play something other than a racist old bourgeois! The role of Zorglub fits like a glove to Ramzy who plays very well the geniuses of evil. Spirou is quite transparent, because played by an actor who does not have the required adventurous aspect. But we can highlight the performance of Alex Lutz, who by his ability to play the haughty and ridiculous dandies makes an admirable Fantasio!
The film is pretty as a whole, with very nice sets. We respect the domains of the characters, whose presence is logical in each of the places: the villain in his landmark, Spirou in a hotel… The film offers us adventure, with a lot of different landscapes. They might be considered too cliché. But after all, in comics, as soon as you see a desert, isn't there an oasis in the next pages? In addition, we find the pleasure of these shots. Zorglub is presented as a true mad scientist, with all that characterizes him. And in that, there is the hidden high-tech landmark. And this one is superb: spectacular entrance, elegant and hard industrial design at the same time, hiding traps, nec plus ultra built on a volcano in activity! Enough to impress children and satisfy parents.
In addition, the setting is chosen in such a way as to "compress" the universe of Spirou in order to plausibly gather (finally to try) in the same place, in order to recreate the comic in a minimum of time, which does not work quite correctly. Indeed, the meetings seem artificial, especially on behalf of Champignac. He lives in a hotel room, for no apparent reason other than his wealth. Spirou should not even be there, because he is a thief who does not know the hotel. At the limit, only Fantasio has a real reason to be there because he is looking for someone. We therefore put the logic of meetings at random. Difficult task and which is here rather failed, because it leaves the impression that we have made all the characters fit in a small box with heels. Which is a shame because the meeting of the characters is a key element of the film.
The choice of an initial meeting
The film does not assume that the characters already know each other. We do not propose a new episode of Spirou and Fantasio, but a kind of reboot. This is obvious in the sense that we spend a good part of the film seeing the characters meet, even if it means making the characters appear totally artificially. However, it is a rather well exploited red thread, as when Spirou finds himself in the same elevator as Zorglub, which leads to a tension that could never have existed if they had been declared sworn enemies and well known to each other from the beginning. It is therefore a perfectly assumed idea. But the formula "as if by chance!" may come to mind often, as this is so blatant.
The oldest fans will be disappointed to see that their hero is made a thief. Spirou at the beginning was certainly a prankster, but not a thief. It's easy to understand that this makes him a more interesting character for today's youth. We can also think that as the current generation does not know Spirou, we can do anything with it.
And we can only salute the director for not having given in to temptation. Indeed, despite obvious changes, we keep the appearance of Spirou with the famous helicopter backpack, the duo that still works as well between the intrepid and the intellectual a little wanton, and the villain remains largely a real villain. He has a landmark, kills shamelessly, wants to control the world. A great classic, so classic that it becomes restful for the mind and justifies action like a MacGuffin: he wants to control the world! But why? We do not know but it gives a story full of action and too bad for the rest. We will also note with the action the principle of travel around the world and action, with a survey. And all this constitutes the background of the comic, which is therefore not betrayed on this point. On the other hand, not to mention betrayal, other surprises and not necessarily good ones, await the adult spectator.
A humor not always very fine
The humor of the film is unfortunately that of comedies with Kev Adams and Kad Merad, which recall the humor of American films of the last twenty years, with a character who does something impressive to end up making a fool of himself in front of everyone. Something we had plenty of time to get tired of. And who will even demolish what should remain classic, because it works particularly well, which did not need ridicule, on the contrary. The best example is Zorglub, played by Ramzy. As much as the new status of thief of Spirou is not very disturbing, but it is. Indeed, we manage to pose a real villain, why demolish him like this? Especially since Ramzy manages to play a bad and intelligent character. We don't need to make this character funny. But we are in an era where nothing has to be serious, where everything has to be comedy and derision. This character proves by himself that we need entirely dark and crazy characters in a fiction and that it is a shame to make him ridiculous.
We had already noticed this in Obelix and Asterix in the Queen's Service: making a serious character ridiculous does not make him funny, just ridiculous and diminishes his role unnecessarily. We can also use the example of this film to show that we have already tried to make a film that questions the immutable friendship between two characters so well known that we do not imagine seeing them separated. It's a good idea at first, but we suspect so much about the end, with this "I love you me neither" so redundant in the history of cinema that any doubt evaporates at the very moment when the problem arises. Because precisely: we know from this moment that the problem will be solved. Which is really a shame
Similarly, the hitman duo is heavy, as is the taser's running gag. Which, once you're over ten years old, is tiresome. But just like the good old jokes about feces (of course included in the film and that you will discover for yourself); It makes children laugh who have not yet had time to see enough jokes of this kind to stop laughing at them.
Yes, Spirou et Fantasio can conquer a young audience, because everything is done in its form to get there, at the risk of displeasing the oldest fans. It is a family film that constantly oscillates between the old and the new, which with its cohort of popular actors, will make families spend a good Sunday afternoon, with simple humor and some good ideas. On the other hand, if you are tired of the Anglo-Saxon type of humor, go your way because it is omnipresent in the film. And if you like it, go there already hoping for a sequel, strongly announced by the film.
Trailer of Spirou and Fantasio
