The rare reboot pitch that that can actually be greeted with “this again!” rather than “this again?,” “Call My Agent! The Movie” makes sense of its rote title in two ways. First, and most obviously, it’s a feature-length spinoff of the hit French comedy series, which wittily satirized the national showbiz industry from the perspective of its beleaguered talent agents. But second, “the movie” doesn’t just refer to the one we’re watching, as this two-hour return tracks the tortured production process of the first film directed by the show’s heroine, now-former agent Andréa Martel (Camille Cottin). But if the point of view has changed, the comedy remains on-target: Fleet and fast-talking and packed, as ever, with Gallic industry in-jokes and celebrity cameos, Émilie Noblet’s film can hardly fail to please longtime fans when it hits Netflix on Sept. 10.
Nearly six years have passed since the fourth season of “Call My Agent!” concluded on something of a bombshell — as the Paris-based talent agency Agence Samuel Kerry (ASK) folded in a state of near-bankruptcy, with its employees scattered in various ambiguous directions. If not altogether unhappy, it was a destabilizing ending that hit pretty hard when the final episode hit in late 2020, given that COVID at that point had the global entertainment industry in a state of crippling uncertainty. So it’s comforting to see the old faces of ASK back with new career trajectories, even if — as fey former assistant Hervé (Nicolas Maury) makes clear in a catch-up intro delivered directly to camera — some are doing better than others.
Doing very well for themselves indeed are former ASK hotshot Mathias (Thibault de Montalembert), still representing A-list talent at the new agency he founded with his daughter Camille (Fanny Sidney), and his erstwhile assistant turned wife Noémie (Laure Calamy), who has found surprising success as a TV producer. His old office rival Andréa, meanwhile, is happy to have left agenting behind for a more creative career as a writer-director, though as her debut feature “The Fugitive” (not a remake of the Harrison Ford vehicle) enters pre-production, she despairs to find herself putting out fires all too familiar from her former line of work.
It doesn’t help that her intended leading man Laurent Lafitte (popping up very drolly as himself) is represented by Mathias, still nursing professional grudges and willing to sabotage the whole project — even when Noémie jumps on board as producer. Andréa’s first choice for that job, Eva Longoria, smilingly puts herself out of contention when she suggests that the script, a gritty female survivalist revenge drama led by Laetitia Casta, might work better as a Parisian wish-fulfilment romance.
Americans in general are not helpful allies on this enterprise: Wes Anderson doesn’t appear on screen, but his latest shoot scuppers proceedings from afar, while in a standout cringe-comedy scene, an initially encouraging meeting with George Clooney (another good-humored cameo) goes south when Noémie inadvertently disses his direction of the mediocre WWII romp “The Monuments Men.” The script, by showrunner Fanny Herrero with Lison Daniel, tosses out throwaway barbs so pacily and plentifully that industry outsiders may not altogether keep up with the satire — though it’s hard to miss Gérard Depardieu catching some well-earned strays.
Just as often, however, the characters reserve their ire for each other: Though the gang is now scattered, the film still captures the fizzy love-hate relations that made the series such a winning workplace comedy. “Call My Agent! The Movie” will play amusingly enough for non-acolytes, but it does assume some knowledge of the show’s tangled character dynamics. Drawing a slightly short straw in this story is Andréa’s estranged best friend Gabriel (Grégory Montel), now unhappily working at rival agency Starmédia, though it speaks to the show’s relative complexity that a movie-length reboot can’t tie up all loose ends — even if a calamitous turn in Andréa’s shoot winds up uniting nearly everyone toward a common cause.
Though it’s slickly cut and shot in surprisingly glossy widescreen by gifted DP Aurélien Marra (an ASC winner a few years back for “Two of Us”), the greatest pleasures of the film are the more televisual ones of the original series: the breathless cut and thrust of the dialogue, and the immaculate timing of the performances. Cottin remains a drily smart, likably peppery lead, perfectly countering the spiraling scattiness of the wonderful Calamy. They’re a double act to treasure here, their passive-aggressive exchanges the stuff of sitcom perfection, and plenty pleasurable in movie form too.
