CAMILLE and Odile are sisters living in Paris. While Odile leads a 'normal' married life with her husband Claude, Camille is working on her interesting thesis, 'the yeomen in the year 1000 at Lake Paladru'. Through her part-time job as a tour guide she meets a history-freak and romantic radio-playwright, Simon, who works for an estate agent. It happens to be exactly that estate agency from which Odile is buying her new dream flat. Things get even more complicated when Marc, the boss of that very agency, falls for Camille. And as if that hadn't caused enough confusion already, Nicolas, a hyperchondriac and former lover of Odile, suddenly appears in Paris and is now looking for a place to live...

Sound like the perfect setting for one of those hideous, triangular French soaps? Far from it! Although the plot is intricate, "On Connait La Chanson" is hilarious. Director Alain Resnais adopts Dennis Potter's lip-synch to music device, having his protagonists break out into song at emotional moments and crises, even when it's inappropriate. This creates a highly comical effect, and an absurd hyperreality, since all of the sung passages are in context and come from either old French chansons or contemporary French hits. Adapting to this particular narrative technique doesn't take long. In fact, an excellent cast soon have you believing that sudden outbreaks of song in different voices is the most natural thing to do in the world. And, as Renais proves in this highly original work, there is an appropriate song for every situation in life!

Medusa