Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines

(Conrad & Crab – Idiotic Gems, Claude Schmitz, Belgium/France, 2026)

On this website, I usually defer to the officially chosen English title for non-English-language films (with all the usual exceptions). But, in the case of a delightful feature that I saw (thanks to the Rotterdam Film Festival) under the name Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines (indicating a small town in north-eastern France), I refuse to bow to its particularly awful replacement-title for export, Conrad & Crab – Idiotic Gems, which seems to be a desperate attempt to sell it abroad as a rollicking comedy. The film’s tone, however, is more left-of-field.

Two less-than-splendid members of the judicial police of Perpignan, Alain (Rodolphe Burger) and Francis (Francis Soetens), arrive in this town to watch over the activities of the local market fair. They are regarded as uppity outsiders from a Big City, and they know it – so they basically try to stay out of everyone’s way. In investigating a seemingly trivial matter, however, they stumble onto a potentially bigger criminal network.

Don’t expect a procedural mystery-thriller from writer-director Claude Schmitz (Braquer Poitiers, 2018). With a touch of Jacques Tati, it’s the seeming digressions from the plot that create the richness of this finely observed social mosaic.

This is especially so when Francis becomes intimately involved with one of the townsfolk, while Alain awkwardly relates to an ex-lover (Anne Suarez as Jeanne) who is now his boss.

Differences in class, gender and ethnic lifestyle, alongside varying attitudes to law and order, trigger a whimsical, downbeat comedy of manners. Schmitz crates wonderful moments when things happen unexpectedly in distant or hidden zones of the frame – such as locals complaining or gossiping as they pass by, far in the background of an ongoing scene: and a typical ‘touristic’ view that is subverted by its dialogue accompaniment, “It’s a real postcard – if we forget about the slums”.

As well, the film holds a special treat for music fans: the performance by Burger, noted for multimedia collaborations with Jeanne Balibar (see Pedro Costa’s Ne change rien [2009]), among many other works. In particular: don’t walk out on (or turn off) the end credits!

© Adrian Martin 23 October 2025