C'est la vie!

The starting point was one long take in Éric Toledano and Olivier Nakache’s earlier film Samba, which carried the camera out of the reception hall and into the back rooms. Both directors had waited tables at weddings early in their working lives, and before writing they went back to watch present day catering crews at work. Shooting ran nine weeks in the summer of 2016 across the Île-de-France region, mostly at the 17th century Château de Courances in Essonne, with further scenes in Paris and around Fontainebleau. The project carried two working titles, Le grand saut and Les temps difficiles; the directors later reworked the second one into Une année difficile in 2023. The score came from the jazz bassist Avishai Cohen, whom they approached after a concert. It sold 3,020,694 tickets in France. At the 43rd César ceremony in March 2018 it collected 10 nominations, among them best film, best director and best actor for Jean-Pierre Bacri, and won none of them; BPM took six awards including best film. A good fit if you want the service traffic between kitchen and hall rather than the wedding itself, and want to spot where the directors’ own years waiting tables surface. Not for anyone who finds a large cast crossing paths in one location tiring to follow.