Welcome to the Sticks (Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis) 2008

The opening of the film rings a few alarm bells – Kad Merad hamming it up as Phillipe, the mildly buffoonish Post Office manager. It almost looks like it’s about to turn into a Gallic Carry On film. But when his character arrives in the northern town of Bergues, Merad settles and the humour begins to flow. By the time his wife visits to see the ‘living hell’ he has described to her (which is nothing of the sort), this has become a pretty sweet little movie - or indeed BIG movie if you go by its success in its home country.

There are a couple of distinctly fromage-y emotional threads – Phillipe attempting to please his depressed wife, and Antoine the feckless mailman (played by comedian Dany Boone, who wrote the film) trying to tell his mother to butt out of his personal life so he can be with the mademoiselle he loves. And of course you can see from a mile off that it will all come good. But when it does, it does so endearingly, capping off a whimsical tale that will change no-one’s life, but should raise a titter or two. Hide