For every Englishman, there is the Irishman. For every Russian, an Estonian. For the French – there are the Belgians.

But French humour doesn’t deserve such a bad rap. It’s not all jokes about the Belgians (although here’s one: “The train to Milan will leave at 7:45; the train to Berlin will leave at 8:20; the train to Brussels will leave when the big hand is on the five and…”).

Take, for instance, one of the most deliciously bizarre black comedies I’ve seen in the last few years – Serial Lover. In this off-beat comedy, an attractive young Parisian accidentally knocks off all her suitors in an evening of morbid mishap. You’ll never be able to look at an ice-skate in the same way again…

Having a poke around in the way of “research”, I also see that French actress Isabelle Nanty also played in this film. Name doesn’t ring a bell? Well the face will. Nanty is best known to an English-language audience as the insufferable hypochondriac, Georgette, who works behind the tabac counter in Amelie (or Amelie of Montmartre or Le Fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain, however you know it). She also plays Itinéris (a pun on a mobile phone company, thus translated as Vodafonis) in Asterix & Obelix: Mission Cleopatra.


Meet Georgette…

Isabelle Nanty is also our only brush with fame in Paris so far. Having a coffee one day near Montparnasse, I butted in when Guillaume was talking about something, to observe: “She looks just like the woman from Amelie and Asterix.”

Indignant about the interruption, Guillaume continued and concluded what he was saying, and then began to berate me for my inability to listen to a stream of conversation without adding my off-the-topic two cents.

“Which woman?” he added, “I don’t even know who you’re talking about.”

I sulked, and argued that it wasn’t such a big deal for him to turn his head mid-monologue, and explained in no uncertain terms her role in Amelie, and with a lot of uncertain terms a bit of… “you know, in that A-Z comedian special we saw, which fortunately we only saw around the M’s, she was on it. From Asterix, the bzzt-upt-bzzst mobile phone woman with bad reception… well, you know, she’s just sitting a couple of tables… you’ll see.”

And sure enough, it was her. Our heated discussion immediately cooled to silence as Guillaume turned to gawk and I began to blush and concentrate intently on my coffee.

“Stop… looking… you’re… being… too… obvious” I hissed into my saucer, but Guillaume was overjoyed at our first star spotting. It was funny though, when we finally relaxed and resumed with our drinks, to watch the some of the passers-by as recognition also slowly dawned for them. People would slow their stride, half-turn their head as their jaw simultaneously dropped, and then regathering their gait, would wander away with a smile and a quick double-check as they passed.