Les Visiteurs

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For other uses, see Visitor (disambiguation)

Les Visiteurs
DVD Cover
Directed by	Jean-Marie Poiré
Produced by	Alain Terzian
Written by	Jean-Marie Poiré Christian Clavier
Starring	Jean Reno Christian Clavier Valérie Lemercier Christian Bujeau
Music by	Eric Lévi (ERA) Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy
Release date(s)	27 January 1993
Running time	107 Minutes
Country	France
Language	French
Followed by	Les Visiteurs II
IMDb profile

Les Visiteurs ("The Visitors") is a cult French film directed by Jean-Marie Poiré and released in 1993. In this comedy, a 12th-century knight and his servant travel in time to the end of the 20th century and find themselves adrift in modern society.

Les Visiteurs was the Number 1 box office film in France in 1993, with 13,782,846 ticket sales.^[1] The publicity for the film used the tagline Ils ne sont pas nés d'hier ("They weren't born yesterday").

Reno and Clavier later reprised their roles in a sequel, and an American remake of the movie entitled Just Visiting.

1 Story
2 Cast
3 Sequel
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Story

In the year 1123, Godefroy, Count of Appremont and Papincourt, saves the life of his beloved sovereign, King Louis VI "Le Gros" ("The Fat") from the sword of a "horribilis" Englishman.

For this action of bravery, the King makes him Count of Montmirail and gives him the woman he loves, the beautiful Frénégonde de Pouille. On his way to go to the castle to marry Frénégonde, Godefroy is poisoned by a witch that he had earlier made his prisoner. Under the effects of the poison, Godefroy believes that the father of his future wife, the Duke of Pouille, is a ferocious bear, and kills him with a crossbow bolt. To repair his mistake, Godefroy asks the wizard Eusebius to send him back in time to a moment before he shot the Duke. During the Duke's funeral, Godefroy's servant, Jacquouille la Fripouille, steals the Duke's jewels. Later, the old wizard makes an error with his magical spell, and accidentally sends Godefroy and Jaquouille to the year 1992. There, after a few problems with the Gendarmerie they meet Béatrice de Montmirail and Ginette la Clocharde. Béatrice is Godefroy's great-great-great-great-great-great-granddaughter. Ginette is a hobo living in an old mobile home. Ginette befriends Jaqouille, and then they all arrive at Béatrice's home. She thinks that Godefroy is her long lost cousin, Hubert. She sees the family seal on Godefroy's hand, and thinks that he stole the jewel from the castle de Montmirail, now a hotel. They go there and meet Jacques-Henri Jacquard, the owner of the castle and unwitting descendant of Jacquouille. The jewel on Godefroy's hand starts to burn as they get closer to the castle, where the present day version of the seal is. The two seals explode and destroy Jacquard's brand new Range Rover. Godefroy books a room for the night intending to find a secret passage known to him, but only rumored to exist by those living in the present day. Godefroy ventures into the a secret passage, and finds a letter for him. He goes to the address in the letter, and he gets the potion from the descendant of the wizard Eusebius. He tries to persuade Jacquouille to come home with him, and finally brings him to the hotel room by force.

While Godefroy is talking with Béatrice, Jacquouille swaps jackets with his descendant, closes the curtains, dims the lights, and puts Jacquard on the bed in his place. In the dark, Godefroy gives Jacquard the potion which then sends him back to the year 1123. Godefroy comes back just in time to stop himself from shooting the father of Frédégonde, the Duke of Pouille. The bewildered Jacquard chases after Godefroy and Frédégonde, begging for an explanation of what is going on.

[edit] Cast

The two main characters, Godefroy and Jacqouille engaging in one of their many physical arguments throughout the film.

Christian Clavier: Jacquouille la Fripouille / Jacques-Henri Jacquard
Jean Reno: Godefroy de Papincourt, Count of Montmirail

Valérie Lemercier: Frénégonde de Pouille / Béatrice de Montmirail
Christian Bujeau: Jean-Pierre Goulard
Marie-Anne Chazel: Ginette la Clocharde
Isabelle Nanty: Fabienne Morlot
Gérard Séty: Edgar Bernay
Didier Pain: Louis VI le Gros Louis VI the Fat
Jean-Paul Muel: Maréchal-des-Logis Gibon
Arielle Séménoff: Jacqueline
Michel Peyrelon: Édouard Bernay
Pierre Vial: Eusebius the Wizard / Monsieur Ferdinand
François Lalande: Prêtre
Didier Bénureau: Doctor Beauvin
Frédéric Baptiste: Freddy

[edit] Sequel

A sequel, Les Visiteurs 2, was released to a generally poor reception. Some factors contributing to the disappointment of the French audience include the fact that some of the actors had been changed and that the film contained advertisements for various brands.