Is “Les Boules de Noël” a Hit? Viewers React to Comedy Starring Valérie Bonneton & Kad Merad!

Four years after the comedy “Mes très chers enfants” featuring Josiane Balasko and Didier Bourdon, director Alexandra Leclère returns with “Les Boules de Noël.” This comedy stars Valérie Bonneton, Kad Merad, Noémie Lvovsky, and Rosa Bursztein.

For Nathalie (Bonneton) and Antonin’s (Merad) family, Christmas Eve always turns into a nightmare. Believing she’s cursed, Nathalie makes a drastic decision: no Christmas celebrations this year! However, Antonin and their children take matters into their own hands by inviting Nicole (Lvovsky), Nathalie’s estranged sister. Will they finally avoid disaster this year?

What do the first viewers think of the feature film? With 44 ratings and 15 reviews, “Les Boules de Noël” has an average audience score of 2.2 out of 5 stars.

Bold Humor

Audiences appreciate the actors’ performances, especially that of Valérie Bonneton. 25% of the comments find the film funny and entertaining, like S PBC who writes: “Great comedy film, the gags keep coming, there’s never a dull moment. I really had fun, kudos to the actors.”

According to Julien Di, “Les Boules de Noël” is “A hilarious movie that provides a great opportunity to laugh at Christmas and its stereotypes. It’s the kind of bold humor we love! I recommend it.”

Jean-Pierre Gallou, however, notes that it’s not a movie for young children “Great film, but not for kids who still believe in Santa Claus. The actors performed excellently. We had a great time.”

Futura93 shares, “I had an excellent time, I went because of Valérie Bonneton and I was not disappointed, she’s definitely my favorite actress!”

Killian believes it’s a film best enjoyed in a theater to experience the collective laughter: “To appreciate this film, watching it in a theater seems essential to be carried by the audience’s laughter. But make no mistake, it’s not the film of the year, probably not even of the month or the week. Yet, it delivers a good time and with a relentless pace of jokes, some really hit the mark!”

…or Awkward

Others, however, find the humor awkward and the plot too clichéd, like Hélène S who notes: “It’s enjoyable, the actors are perfect, but a majority of the gags are either too heavy or go nowhere. One of them is even off the mark (the cross-eyed child). We definitely miss ‘Fais pas ci, Fais pas ça…’”

Shawn777 laments that “the gags from the trailer are literally in the first five minutes of the film.” He adds: “The film has a rather dark and absurd humor, which I appreciate, but it remains conventional comedy, as if the film never really allows itself to go into full satire. And that’s the whole problem with the film, it never knows where it wants to go, so it ends up going anywhere, even into toilet humor, which are surely the most awkward scenes of the film. Moreover, the film is predictably clichéd. While ‘Les Boules de Noël’ sometimes has sharp dialogue, mostly it just feels boring with lots of awkward moments.”

Finally, Dirty Sale comments, “This type of session where everyone laughs at poop, pee, or vomit jokes just makes me deeply uncomfortable, especially since most of the gags are terribly predictable. The comedy of repetition can work when it’s based on a solid foundation, but here, everything falls flat. Everything is caricatured and ridiculous. It’s like a French ‘Scary Movie’ for Christmas (in November!). One of the worst films I’ve seen this year. Absolutely avoid!”

In Conclusion

An early Christmas comedy that will delight fans of Valérie Bonneton and bold humor. The predictable script and the heaviness of some jokes seem to be the weak points of the film according to early reviews.

“Les Boules de Noël” is now showing in theaters. Feel free to leave your review after seeing it.