Critic Reviews

Who wouldn’t want a picturesque trip to the French capital that delivers more laughs than a nitrous oxide leak near the hyena compound? In fact, I’d go as far as to promise that Lost in Paris offers the three most delightful sight gags you’ll see on screen all year.

The lost art of slapstick — physical comedy — is so rarely practiced that when true masters of it show up on screen it’s like a surprise smack right on your funnybone.

It may be a specialist’s rarified sort of work now, but Gordon and Abel really know what they’re doing. It’s gentle and admittedly closer to a divertissement than a full-course comic meal. But no one else is doing anything like this at the moment.

Lost in Paris is nonsensical by design, a comedy of the absurd that’s always entertaining and occasionally pure.

Although rife with pratfalls, near-misses, crazy coincidences and mistaken identities, “Lost in Paris” is a whirligig contraption that never turns frenetic or throws too much at you. It’s like a Jean-Pierre Jeunet farce on Xanax, with a soothing dose of Wes Anderson whimsy for good measure.

From multi-talented Belgian/Canadian duo Dominique Abel and his partner Fiona Gordon comes a slice of light-hearted whimsy.

The pair blends storybook visuals with a stream of clever gags and oodles of pathos to deliver an infectious romance almost too eager to please at every turn.

A throwback to a kinder, gentler comic sensibility combining the surreal, the whimsical and vaudeville, Lost in Paris successfully delights as two misfits continue to find themselves beholden to the kind of destiny that only graces visitors to the city of lights.

Despite a few instances of profanity, the film could be at home fifty years ago. Lost in Paris is a capricious diversion with enough English that subtitle-phobes won’t feel completely adrift.

Lost in Paris grows a bit tiresome at feature length, but it’s a winning divertissement.