A kooky and farfetched idea, Louise-Michel is certainly entertaining; but, despite the best efforts of Yolande Moreau, the film falls short on a number of occasions...

Fans of Gustave de Kervern and Benoît Delépine's kooky sense of humour will be pleased to know the zany writing team behind last year's Mammuth - and 2004's darkly comic and highly inventive wheelchair road movie, Aaltra - are back with their latest offering, Louise-Michel.

The Euro is strong and orders are down in economically bad times, but, after reassurances from the factory bosses, the workers are given their own name-embroidered smocks. Yet upon arriving to work the next day they find, without any warning, that the factory has been shut down and decide to call a worker's meeting. As a result of said meeting, the workers are offered a mere 2,000 Euros for over 20 years work - an insulting offer that leaves a bitter taste - until ex-con Louise suggests they pool their resources and hire a hit-man to “whack” their unscrupulous bosses. Well, it's that or making a nude calendar...and hasn't that been done enough?

De Kervern and Delépine rely on the same quirky characters and bizarre set pieces to recreate their own outlandish brand of comedy in Louise-Michel. Their protagonist, Louise - who is also inexplicably known as Jean-Pierre - calls Michel “Cow” and has done fifteen years for murder. She doesn't drink and can't read, sounding out the vowels of the words “Final Eviction Notice” and speaking in her own distinctive way: “Me, don't like newspapers”.

The other titular character, Michel, is equally absurd as the factory workers' salvation -  a security guard/hit-man discovered by Louise when he accidentally drops a gun. Immediately impressed by Michel, Louise hires him on behalf of the girls at the clothing factory, reassuring him that “the dude's done a lot of things” and misguidedly describing him as “good, great - a real pro”. We, however, are privy to Michel's indiscreet firing at the sky and his collection of replica fire-arms. Bordering on humour whilst bordering on extremely poor taste is the scene showing Michel's ridiculous attempt to sub-contract work to his hospitalised cousin Jenny, before kidnapping her from the hospital in an ill-fitting 80's cocktail dress.

While Michel and Louise haplessly plan to kill the factory executives, the very people they seek to destroy are shown carelessly playing a game of rock, paper, scissors before laying off the workers and worrying about the finer things in life, like brie and real estate. De Kervern and Delépine make Louise and her co-workers the true underdogs by establishing this degree of ignorance and minimal remorse within their ex-bosses. Their behaviour is so guiltless and immoral it's despicable - the factory top dog is seen robotically yelling “buy-sell” into his mobile while on a treadmill and signing papers...talk about establishing a social divide.

Aside from Louise and Michel, De Kervern and Delépine populate their world with equally madcap characters. There's the neck-cone wearing 'Big Belgian', who says he'd “die for Michel, but only in [his] birth place”; a concealed dwarf, and a decidedly odd trans-gender stripper who puts on a show for our leads as they have a 'quiet' beer.

The strange reactions and mannerism of these characters are another source of quietly comic humour, alongside the bizarre situations they of course find themselves in. Louise is shown hysterically laughing at a children's TV programme starring a fox wearing a wig; our leads become stowaways on a boat of illegal immigrants and have to wade for the last section of their journey; an office worker uses a Segway to get along corridors and the company headquarters of Nin Nin International; scenes such as they really are ingenious.

Like Mammuth, Louise-Michel explores chasing the paper trail; inadvertently becomes a road movie of sorts, and stars the excellent, Yolande Moreau (Mammuth, Gainsbourg, MicMacs, Amelie). Wanting a better life without smoking butt-ends, chasing slugs for dinner and walking to save on gas, Louise has all the oomph while Michel wants to give up. Seeing the sheer look of pure determination on Moreau's face reminds us what a fantastic actress she is and tellingly reveals how drab Louise-Michel would be without her. Despite De Kervern and Delépine's every attempt to make the film memorable, it's unfortunately no Aaltra, and a particularly surreal ending suggests that they may have gone a bit too far on the oddball this time around.

Louise-Michel is out now.

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