City Cinema: Meet The Barbarians (Les Barbares)

Drama, Comedy. PG. Sexual content.
Dir: Julie Delpy, France, 2024, 101 min.
Julie Delpy, Sandrine Kiberlain, Laurent Lafitte.
In French with English subtitles.

“In the culture-clash comedy Meet the Barbarians, actor-director Julie Delpy lays bare a number of Western hypocrisies. The film follows several townspeople in the struggling French commune of Paimpont, who vote to welcome a handful of Ukrainian refugees, but are caught by surprise when a Syrian family shows up instead. The ensuing response runs the gamut from clumsy to hostile, which Delpy captures by applying a documentary-like lens to the town’s fabric, and to their Arab guests. The result is a movie that… proves eye-wateringly funny. The film flies out the gate with an energy reminiscent of “The Office,” as bumbling mayor Sébastien Lejeune regales a TV news crew with his plans to welcome a Ukrainian family. The city council votes overwhelmingly in favor. Even potential holdout Hervé Riou, the sour-faced town plumber, gives in after a slight nudge from his peers. A number of local interviews paint the issue of Russia’s invasion, and of welcoming Ukrainians with open arms, as one generally agreed upon, despite the fears and economic reservations folks like Hervé might harbor. However, these doubts come bubbling back to the surface when the town learns of the administrative switcheroo… The aforementioned Syrian family, the Fayads, are for the most part presented unremarkably, though this is part of Deply’s point… In what is perhaps the movie’s biggest strength, Delpy presents these apparent opposites as two sides of the very same coin, whose respective approaches stem from the same wellspring of prejudice and misunderstanding, even though they manifest differently… It’s a bright, sunny and immaculately entertaining story, despite its dark corners. However, Delpy never loses sight of the bigger picture, offering constant clues that the world continues to be harsh for Muslim refugees even outside this one hilarious story.” —Siddhant Adlakha, Variety