Sometimes I feel like you’re really taking me for an imbecile.— François Pignon
Another warm Kampala evening at Aftersun Film Club. This time, we were amused by Francis Veber’s Le Dîner de Cons, a French comedy about a game played by Parisian elites: each week, they compete to bring the most entertaining “idiot” to dinner. The sport is cruelty dressed as sophistication. Our protagonist, Pierre Brochant, is charming, wealthy, and casually monstrous. François Pignon makes matchstick models of famous monuments. The premise is sharp, the setup is simple, and the question the room couldn’t shake all evening was the obvious one: who was the idiot, exactly?
The room lit up during the film — genuinely, collectively. There is something particular about laughing together in a dark room, the way it reminds you that other people are there. But by the time the lights came up, the laughter had opened into something more interesting. Because Pignon, for all his bumbling, had empathy. He asked questions. He paid attention. By the end of the evening, he knew an enormous amount about Pierre’s life, not because he pried, but because he actually took an interest. Pierre knew almost nothing about Pignon beyond the matchstick models. It never occurred to him to ask. Connection requires curiosity. Pierre had none.
That’s where the room found its sharpest edges. One Aftersunette noted that the film is, beneath the farce, a quiet portrait of French class. Wealth looking down from a great height, arranging other people like objects. And yet the wealthy man is the one who ends the evening alone. The film notices this without quite sitting with it, which some found frustrating. We wanted more weight on that image. Pierre’s loneliness felt like the real punchline, and the film moved on before we could feel it fully.
We disagreed beautifully, as usual. Someone was accused of playing devil’s advocate simply for preferring Pignon — the kind, curious, slightly chaotic man — over Pierre, who cheats on his wife, mocks vulnerable people, and avoids his taxes. The accusation didn’t stick. Preferring kindness isn’t a controversial position. It felt like this was, perhaps, the most interesting thing the film did to us.
One Aftersunette changed her position entirely over the course of the discussion. Arrived thinking one thing, left thinking another. Someone pointed it out. She shrugged, delighted. Why not? A true testament of what makes this community so special.
The ending left some of us wanting more. Pignon deserved, we felt, to build better walls, not to become cold, but to protect the warmth he so freely gives. The film stops just short of asking that of him, or of Pierre. It lets everyone off a little gently.
Before the feature, a short film — a quiet, beautiful thing about what love can look like. It arrived and departed without fuss, and set exactly the right mood for everything that followed.
What Le Dîner de Cons understands, underneath all the farce and the chaos, is that cruelty is its own punishment. That the people who arrange others for sport tend to end up alone, in quiet apartments, with no one asking about their lives. And that curiosity — real, generous, unglamorous curiosity, might be the most radical thing one person can offer another.
As Aftersun, we are grateful for a room full of people who still know how to offer it. Who show up, laugh together, disagree with warmth, and leave having thought a little harder about how they move through the world. That is the whole point. That has always been the whole point.
As always,
Take care.
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