The recently departed Kevin Tierney was the producer behind Bon Cop, Bad Cop, the film that brought together French and English in a Canadian film. Tierney directing another film that also involves English and French is understandable, the result being the comedy French Immersion.
The plot is pretty simple: Anglophones come to St-Isidore, a small town in Quebec, to learn French effectively and quickly. The small French town is in trouble because the government is investigating their school, the major business of the small town.
The anglophones include Bobby Sexton, a politician who wants to run for federal party leadership (Gavin Crawford), someone needing to know French for a promotion (Fred Ewanuick, Corner Gas), a flight attendant (Oluniké Adeliyi, Republic of Doyle) who has taken the immersion course twice before, and a New York City chef (Jacob Tierney) who wants to open a French restaurant.
The townsfolk include the head of the French immersion school (Pascale Bussières), her father (Robert Charlebois, Gabrielle), a federal senator, and the teacher (Karine Vanasse).
The running joke is all but one of the people in the town have the last name Tremblay. Sexton gets confused when he is told that he will be staying in the bedroom of the daughter who is away at CEGEP. Sexton thinks the daughter's name is Cegep and she was killed by a bus. These jokes are aimed more at the Quebec audience than the anglophones.
Sexton is running for the leadership of the Completely Canadian Party against Michael Pontifikator (Colm Feore, Bon Cop, Bad Cop).
As a nice reminder that not everything in Canada is English and French, we have Kumar (Ali Hassan), a chef from Mumbai who moved to the small town since he was told the region was where the Indians were, which Kumar took to mean those from India.
Jacob Tierney is the son of Kevin Tierney: Jacob's resume is full of acting, directing, and writing. He is a co-creator, director, and star in Letterkenny. He wrote and directed The Trotsky and Good Neighbours and co-wrote The Death and Life of John F. Donovan with Xavier Dolan.
The anglophones get yellow cards by the townspeople when they speak English. There is a hockey game, well, street hockey game between the anglophones and francophones. The simultaneous English and French anthems is a priceless moment.
French Immersion has the bilingual spirit of Bon Cop, Bad Cop with a much lighter presentation. The languages get along even better in French Immersion. Knowing Canada helps the jokes but like Bon Cop, Bad Cop, you can enjoy the film on its own merits. The people in the film seem like they are having fun on this adventure.
Saint-Cesaire, Quebec serves as St-Isidore for the filming.
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The secondary part of the title is It's Trudeau's Fault | C'est la faute à Trudeau — Pierre, not Justin, since the film came out in 2011. The idea of being a bilingual country grew under Pierre Trudeau.
French Immersion is available through Amazon Prime for an additional fee.
video credit: YouTube/FilmBuff Movies
photo credit: French Immersion film
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