ThiefHott Too much of everything

Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews

BelSports This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Ariella Broughton It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

jandesimpson Although "Drole de Felix" does not seem on the surface to be a problem film, it is, on reflection, a rather difficult one to bring off. The directors have attempted a road movie with a feel-good factor about a young gay French Arab who is taking HIV-positive medication. Seldom has a film been so dependent on the performance of its central character. That the film succeeds at all is entirely due to Sami Bouajila's utterly likeable Felix. As he sets out on his quest from Dieppe where he has just lost his job to find a father in Marseilles whom he has never met, there is not a hint of anguish or self-pity. Here is a chap who almost dances his way along the roads of France between lifts. When, before setting out, he compares medication with a couple of youngsters at an AIDS clinic, the tone is almost lighthearted. Only at one point does his cheerful veneer crack as he tearfully confesses to one of his encounters that he did not tell the police of a brutal attack that he witnessed for fear of possible racial harassment. If the scene does not quite ring true it is due to an uncomfortable shift of mood rather than something that is dramatically not credible. Otherwise the film is all of a piece, particularly in its depiction of gay love. The relationship of Felix with his partner, a schoolteacher in Dieppe who later joins him in Marseilles, is one of real tenderness and affection. So much so that Felix's one promiscuous encounter with a young man who give him a lift is a joyous frolic, the two revelling in each other's nakedness in an otherwise deserted country landscape, a one-off fling that can do no harm to the other permanent relationship. By the end it is all perhaps a little too glib, but the excellent company of Felix in what at times amounts to little more than a French travelogue is worth an hour and a half's suspension of disbelief.

alexo-5 The jazzy opening-credits number (a beautiful Blossom Dearie tune) we hear as Felix glides across the screen on a bicycle perfectly sets the tone for this wonderfully clever and creative gay-themed film from France. In so many gay films, the acceptance of homosexuality is the central struggle in the film - or the horrors of the dating scene, the devestation of being HIV positive etc. etc. etc. I really enjoyed the way these issues were handled in this film. Felix is gay and HIV-positive - that is established from the beginning - and the rest of the film is spent getting to know this man as he gets to know the people on his path to visit his estranged father.Issues of race, age, monogamy, relationships, family, marriage, sexuality, homosexuality and HIV are presented in such a natural way that they do not become "issues" as in most other gay films, but only various parts of Felix's experiences that make life interesting. The characters in the film are refreshingly realistic; some have tempers, some are sometimes rude and they don't always say or do the right thing.Overall, this is a beautiful, breezy film that has freed itself from the constricting influence of "gay culture" - a film that helps you realize that life really has very few limitations.

Bob Drake Felix, a happy-go-lucky gay man, loses his job as a ferry worker (because of the Chunnel) in the north of France and decides to find his father, whom he has never met, in the south by hitchhiking through the countryside, agreeing to meet his lover, who will travel by train, at journey's end. Along the way he meets an assortment of interesting, unusual characters (one segment being called "My Younger Brother," another "My Grandmother") who reaffirm his journey.Felix himself is gay in both senses, despite dealing with a host of pills for HIV. His humor and sunny disposition light up a lighthearted film.Not to be missed.

Jan Spaapen FUNNY FELIX (as the film is called English) should really be "Fun" Felix, not "Comical." The film depicts the travels of a young French guy, ethnically half Moroccan. Felix, after losing his job in Normandy, starts a journey to Marseilles, in the other extreme of France in search of his father, whom he has never met. Along the way, using the back roads, Felix meets a bunch of characters, all of whom are presented as surrogate relatives. He also encounters rampant racism, homophobia, and other obstacles. Nonetheless, Felix manages to enrich the lives of all those he meets, even as he often takes the law and morality into his own hands. He has a gift of simplicity, overcoming adversity, and befriending others which are amazing, and are very well brought to the screen, without fake sentiment or sugary, melodramatic, or moralizing tones. As a movie critic said (loosely): "We would all love to meet a 'Felix' traveling through our lives."