When it comes to Daddy or Mommy (French: Papa ou maman), there are many ways to describe it – mean-spirited, misanthropic and morally bankrupt. It’s also one of the funniest films of the past decade, a comedy that doesn’t pay too much attention to how it is perceived, and instead tries to entertain the viewer by presenting us with a motley crew of utterly reprehensible characters that find themselves in the most awkward situations, from which escape seems increasingly unlikely. There were so many ways this film could’ve failed, so the fact that Martin Bourboulon managed to take a relatively bizarre premise, which has a lot of potential to become an overwrought and ridiculous jumble of ideas, and turned it into a daring and compelling dark comedy that ventures further than any other comedy in recent years, showing itself more than willing to take a few calculated risks. Navigating the razor-thin line between potent, meaningful satire and antisocial apathy towards humanity, the film is a major achievement solely on how it finds humour in the most unexpected places, and pushes further with its premise than most mainstream comedies would dare to do, which gives it a truly acidic edge, and allows it to be one of the most brutal but hilarious deconstructions of the family structure, which is done more damage by heartwarming tales of everyone getting along after some minor quibbles lead them to believe they’re on the brink of collapse. Daddy or Mommy embraces the chaos, and goes in search of even more deranged situations as it ventures through some questionable subject matter with a sardonic sense of humour leading to one of the most delightfully demented eviscerations of the family dynamic one is likely to find.

There’s a mean streak that runs through Daddy or Mommy – this is not a film designed to be endearing in the traditional sense. It was evidently crafted to push the boundaries of what could be done with such a story, presenting the viewer with a set of abhorrent characters that engage in self-serving actions that would be otherwise repulsive if it wasn’t framed through the lens of this engaging and endearing dark comedy. On the surface, it appears that Bourboulon made a very traditional family-based comedy, filled with exuberant scenarios and tensions that ultimately lead to a happy ending. This is certainly not the case, since as the film progresses, we notice that it is heading in the direction of challenging many of the same cliches that we often find in similar films, subverting the familiar structure of family comedies, adding a scathing amount of satire onto a story that didn’t initially call for it. There is an abundance of tension in the film, but instead of engaging in a kind of conflict resolution, Daddy or Mommy just exacerbates it, constantly making the situation worse – it starts as a charming film where everyone gets along, but as it goes on, we start to see the cracks appear in the fabric of the family, which the foundation for some bizarre but oddly captivating comedy. Credit must be given to the team of screenwriters tasked with telling the story, and the director, who was responsible for bringing these characters to life, grappling a very fine line between maniacal and darkly hilarious, the difference being so small, we don’t even notice how similar these ideas are until they’re presented to us in such frank and earnest terms, as made very clear throughout the film.

The divorce drama is a common subject in a lot of films – there is something compelling about these heartbreaking stories of married couples ending their union, and the various challenges they encounter in the process, normally looking at two primary themes, the realization that your partner may not have been your soulmate, and the burden children of divorced couples feel while going through this long and arduous journey that changes their lives. Daddy or Mommy goes in a different direction – the couple is divorcing amicably and intend to remain friends, and the extent to which the children struggle has to do with their parents fighting over custody. The difference being, instead of trying to get named as the main parent themselves, they fight against being the primary guardian of their children, purely for the sake of their individual careers. The idea of seeing an entire film where two parents argue against taking care of their beloved children (who prove to be nightmares in their own right – they certainly inherited this from their parents) is far from traditional, and is one of the reasons Daddy or Mommy is so successful. It’s almost amusing to imagine unsuspecting viewers venturing into this film, expecting a very sweet and sentimental comedy, only to be confronted with some of the most unconventional storytelling that aims to dismantle the entire concept of the familial structure, pointing out the flaws in the idealistic life everyone supposedly aspires towards, proving that it’s not about having the perfect family, but finding meaning in it too, which is a lot more challenging than one would expect when taking a brief glance at this film and all of its unique components.

As a film, Daddy or Mommy would simply not work had it not been for the actors, since they are the primary vessel through which the film intends to explore its unconventional approach to the family dynamic. Nearly everyone in the film is awful in one way or another, but still functionally very interesting and endearing, which comes through in the performances. Laurent Lafitte and NAME, two hard-working French actors that have been doing solid work for years, play the main characters, and while it may not be challenging work for either of them, since they don’t need to do anything particularly revolutionary, they are given the chance to explore their more comedic side, something that isn’t seen as often as one would like. Both are absolutely magnetic, and capture the suburban malaise with such incredible precision, it’s unsurprising that they have become exceptionally strong actors that are frequently scouted for roles in a wide range of films. The film is built on their characters, so without their spirited dedication to playing these despicable individuals, it’s highly unlike that Daddy or Mommy would’ve been much of a success in the first place, since it is driven not only by the dialogue (which the actors deliver perfectly), but also the physicality, insofar as they need to embody these individuals who are caught somewhere between frustration and petty revenge. They are constantly developing these characters as much more than just thin archetypes, and it’s easy to see the amount of thought that went into playing these roles, with both actors being strong individually, as well as creating comic symbiosis with their co-stars, which make this film such a delightfully irreverent work of unhinged humour, since the actors truly abandon their inhibitions and leap into the unknown, leading to the film teetering dangerously close on being an insightful character study of two people falling out of love, which was not the primary intention of the film, but rather a pleasant supplement.

Daddy or Mommy is the rare kind of film that manages to make something original out of a cliched premise. It may not always have the most nuanced take on some ideas, but it is consistently entertaining at the very least, and knows exactly what it wants (and needs) to be, in order to capture our attention. It’s a relatively simple film, and isn’t much more complex than other films that attempt to use divorce as the foundation for comical madness (I was often reminded of the incredible The War of the Roses throughout this film, certainly not bad company for one to be in), but it has a keen sense of humour and a lot of truly unique details that make it far from a mindless comedy. What it lacks in originality it makes up for in ambition, and there is a lot of merit in how Bourboulon and his team of writers used this otherwise sobering and serious topic as an entry-point into a clear satire on family structure, which they assert is far from as idealistic as the global culture has made it seem. It all converges into a really terrific comedic gem that never takes itself too seriously, despite being centred on grave issues. This alone proves that Daddy or Mommy is worth the time and effort, being as hilarious as it is touching, finding a satisfying conclusion that feels genuine rather than just tacked on for the sake of a happy ending, which is much more interesting than we’d have expected from the outset, allowing the film to flourish into the wonderfully malicious dark comedy that reaffirms that the funniest comedy comes from some of the most difficult subjects.