Un fil à la patte

An upper middle-class French family celebrates a birthday in a restaurant. In one evening and during one meal, family history, tensions, collective and separate grudges, delights, and memories both clash and coalesce.

Long married 50-somethings Brigitte and Xavier are prize cattle breeders in regional France. Life is good, but the departure of their children from home has thrown Brigitte’s world into flux, as she finds herself locked into routine. She keeps hoping for something else, something more. A party held by students on the adjoining property accelerates this latent crisis and Brigitte impulsively sets off for Paris under the guise of a doctor’s appointment. The city immediately invigorates her, and when she meets a charming Danish gentleman, she impulsively allows herself to be flattered by his attentions…

Vincent, a wealthy real estate agent, is invited to dinner by his sister Elizabeth and her husband Peter, both professors in Paris. Claude, a childhood friend and trombonist in a symphony orchestra, is also present. Vincent brings news from the prenatal examination of his and his wife Anna's unborn son. The name chosen by the soon-to-be parents strongly offends the others for many reasons. The dispute between the guests quickly escalates and before long the resurgence of old grudges and hidden secrets is unavoidable...

Stressed and overworked, famous French movie star Michel Blanc is beginning to wear down, physically and mentally, from the pressure and demands of fame. Already in a fragile state of mind, strange events start to transpire all around him, and he gradually loses his grip. Taking the advice of a psychiatrist, Blanc retreats to the countryside with his friend Carole Bouquet, but Blanc still has not managed to escape all of his problems.

François Marsault, a war veteran, makes the most of his retirement alongside his wife Annie. Authoritarian and ruthless, François rules his family with an iron fist — but when he discovers that his esteemed wife cheated on him 40 years ago, he files for divorce and confronts her former lover, who lives in the French Riviera.

Michel Berthier, a senior executive at a mattress manufacturing company, has just been fired. As he does not dare to tell the truth to Juliette, his partner, he goes into debt to maintain the family’s standard of living, showering them with gifts. But soon he can no longer lie, and he decides to leave the house. After losing his money, his car, and his shoes, he meets Toubib, Mimosa, and Crayon, three “homeless” people who wash themselves in the restrooms at the Gare de l’Est. They take him under their wing and lead him to break into his former company in order to get sleeping bags and beds.

While doing the inventory for a lingerie outlet in a high rise office building, five attractive women are terrorized by a series of bizarre killings. They suspect that the strange janitor, who witnessed another series of killings years back, is at the bottom of the whole thing. Little do they know the real horror that they face in the end.

Florence and Vincent Leroy are a model couple. They have great jobs, a perfect marriage and delightful children. And now they want their divorce to be an equal success. But when they are both simultaneously promoted to their dream jobs, their relationship becomes a nightmare. From that moment on, the gloves are off, the two exes declare war and will do everything in their power to NOT have custody of their children.

The whole intrigue is centered around carte-blanche documents kept in a vault. Whoever fills in the blank becomes the owner of a revue. Big money is involved. The nephew of the owner of the vault is trying to cheat his uncle and have his name in the documents. Everything is even more complicated because the manager of the bank has a finger in the pie, too. Who but a humble bank-teller (Pierre Richard) will ruin the scheme?

Michel works there manically solving people's problems over the phone. He is about to tie the knot with his girl friend Isabelle, an airline hostess. She flies all over the world, he hates to leave the office. A series of madcap mishaps involving theft or injury (as you would expect in his line of work) ensues after Michel promises Isabelle nothing will delay their marriage and she promises in turn that she's done flying. Once this unlikely promise is made, it becomes premise and both are forced into escalating white lies to maintain the appearance of keeping their word. Their predicament mounts as Isabelle is forced to do a few more flights, while Michel is compelled to travel to New York, Tunisia, and finally Hong Kong, where they are finally reunited in the throes of a contrived and hilarious drug deal involving a 747, water taxi chases, and martial arts.

Angèle, a thirty-something from Ivory Coast, always cope thanks to the gift of gab and audacity. To escape from a bunch of dangerous criminals, she becomes a nanny in the uptown Paris, hired by Hélène, the single mom of eight years old Arthur. Discovering the work conditions of her colleagues, she decides to stand up for their rights, thanks to a young lawyer who will quickly fall for her.

Newly engaged, Thomas meets his future father-in-law Gilbert, who has been married for 30 years to Suzanne. Disillusioned Gilbert is convinced that his marriage has meant he's missed out on life. He persuades Thomas not to marry his daughter Lola and encourages him to drop everything else in his life as well. The two men then throw themselves into a new brats' life full of adventure, convinced that freedom is elsewhere. But at what cost do we rediscover our adolescent dreams?

Paris, in the early 1960s. Jean-Louis Joubert is a serious but uptight stockbroker, married to Suzanne, a starchy class-conscious woman and father of two arrogant teenage boys, currently in a boarding school. The affluent man lives a steady yet boring life. At least until, due to fortuitous circumstances, Maria, the charming new maid at the service of Jean-Louis' family, makes him discover the servants' quarter on the sixth floor of the luxury building he owns and lives in. There live a crowd of lively Spanish maids who will help Jean-Louis to open to a new civilization and a new approach of life. In their company - and more precisely in the company of beautiful Maria - Jean-Louis will gradually become another man, a better man.

38-year-old Alice has everything to become the next editor-in-chief of Rebelle magazine except for her uptight image. But when the young and charming Balthazar, barely 20, crosses Alice's path, she realizes that he holds the key to her promotion.

Two years have passed. After missing their separation, the Leroy seem perfectly successful in their divorce. But the appearance of two new lovers in the life of Vincent and Florence will set fire to the powders. The match between the former spouses resumes.

After getting pregnant from a one-night stand, a single woman leans on her married best friend and mother of two to guide her through gestation and beyond.

Monsieur Cinema, a hundred years old, lives alone in a large villa. His memories fade away, so he engages a young woman to tell him stories about all the movies ever made.

Sandra, a young woman forced to leave the south of France to flee a violent husband. Without attachment, she returned to Boulogne-sur-Mer, the city of her childhood which she left almost 15 years ago. She finds her mother there and a world she left behind. Without money, she is hired in a fish cannery where she befriends two workers. But one day, one of her colleagues tackles her insistently, she defends herself and kills him accidentally.

Compulsive spenders Albert and Bruno are in debt up to their necks. While seeking help from community workers to get their lives back on track, they run into a group of young green activists. Lured by the free beer and snacks rather than by the ideals of eco-activists, Albert and Bruno find themselves joining the movement without much conviction.

Dressed as a clown, the clever rascal Grimm holds up the most secure bank of Montreal and takes 30 hostages. While confusing and ridiculing the police with his strange behavior, he calmly manages to rid the bank of a fortune. But then an unsatisfied companion arouses trouble...