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The Dinner Game

The Dinner Game

Comedy · 1998

For Pierre Brochant and his friends, Wednesday is “Idiots' Day”. The idea is simple: each person has to bring along an idiot. The one who brings the most spectacular idiot wins the prize. Tonight, Brochant is ecstatic. He has found a gem. The ultimate idiot, “A world champion idiot!”. What Brochant doesn’t know is that Pignon is a real jinx, a past master in the art of bringing on catastrophes...

Movie details

The Dinner Game

“A feast for the senseless.”

1998 Comedy 1h 20m

Critical arithmetic

The consensus, allegedly.

IMDb

7.6 / 10

47.1K votes

Rotten Tomatoes

73 %

Tomatometer

Metacritic

73 / 100

Metascore

TMDB

7.8 / 10

Community rating

External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.

For Pierre Brochant and his friends, Wednesday is “Idiots' Day”. The idea is simple: each person has to bring along an idiot. The one who brings the most spectacular idiot wins the prize. Tonight, Brochant is ecstatic. He has found a gem. The ultimate idiot, “A world champion idiot!”. What Brochant doesn’t know is that Pignon is a real jinx, a past master in the art of bringing on catastrophes...

CriticWise case file

What this film says about your taste.

Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.

The archetype split

Who fights over The Dinner Game?

The split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.

Taste neighbourhood

Nearby on the taste map.

TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.

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Where it lives

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Names above the title

The people responsible.

Directed by

Francis Veber

Written by

Francis Veber

Jacques Villeret

Jacques Villeret

François Pignon

Thierry Lhermitte

Thierry Lhermitte

Pierre Brochant

Francis Huster

Francis Huster

Juste Leblanc

Daniel Prévost

Daniel Prévost

Lucien Cheval

Alexandra Vandernoot

Alexandra Vandernoot

Christine Brochant

Catherine Frot

Catherine Frot

Marlène Sasseur

Edgar Givry

Edgar Givry

Jean Cordier

Court is in session

Put The Dinner Game on trial.

Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.

The defence The Arthouse Gremlin

“Ambition earns the room.”

The film reaches for consequence and scale, accepting the risk of seriousness instead of shrinking from it.

The prosecution The Popcorn Loyalist

“Importance has entered the chat.”

The production keeps announcing its significance, as though awards-season posture were proof of insight.