This comedy brings Pierre Richard and Michel Piccoli together onscreen once again. In the story, former professor Henri Toussaint Piccoli has been locked away in a psychiatric ward for some years for trying to strangle his wife when he found her in bed with another man. Now she has a terminal illness, and wants some sort of reconciliation with him. His therapist (Richard) decides to permit him to visit with her, provided he comes along. Except for his wide mood swings and occasional outbursts of lewd muttering, the professor "passes" for sane fairly easily. Not so the psychotic (Dominique Pinon) who stows away in the psychiatrist's car, who constantly calls attention to the other two.
In this surreal comedy, Tonio works very hard for every bit of ill-gotten cash he can get his hands on, but he remains a poor criminal in both senses of the word. He and his buddies Bruno and Hercule think they have the solution to their pocketbook woes. The body of St. Bernadette has been miraculously preserved from decay and is a central object of pilgrimage in the shrine where it is kept. Why not steal that and hold it for ransom? The criminal gang is well able to pull this coup off and are soon in possession of one perfectly preserved corpse and a very fancy coffin. It's too bad for them that the church seems to have a limitless supply of these and doesn't want the one they stole back. Bemused, the lads set the coffin adrift on the river, only to be followed by it as they drive back upriver. In the course of carrying out their criminal designs, these lovable lugs encounter a variety of eccentric characters.
Like every year, five old friends come together in a chalet in the middle of a Canadian snow desert. Henri, his wife Apolline, brother-in-law Maxence, Jean and Paul are waiting for cozy evenings with board games and good food - a typical ski holiday. But on the first day Henri announces that he knows about the affair between Apolline and Jean. An oppressive mood spreads in the secluded hut until the spiral of jealousy and sadism kills one from its midst.
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