Classical muso turned writer-director Denis Dercourt hit the ground running with this brilliant debut that contrives successfully to make Classical music both palatable and highly amusing to a mass audience. The premise is simple enough; one of a group of freelance classical musicians is asked to put together an ensemble to play a New Year's Eve gig at a château in Northern France. He assembles it from amongst colleagues with whom he works regularly with the exception of the clarinet chair which will have to be filled locally. Everything that can go wrong does go wrong, natch, from the internecine rivalry centering on who is going to be leader to the slightly enceinte female member of the group choosing her moment with metronomic precision to the local clarinet player who mentions casually mid-rehearsal that he can't actually 'read' reed music. Utilising his own experience and inside knowledge (he teaches Classical music in his day-time job) Dercourt brews a heady wine guaranteed to intoxicate the senses. Highly recommended.
Review of Les cachetonneurs
