When party-hard Ludo (Jean Dujardin) gets into a disagreement with a truck while driving home from the club one morning – wired, of course – it’s kind of hard to feel sorry for him. When his mates stand outside the hospital, hemming and hawing over whether to stay by their friend’s side in Paris or head off on their annual holiday to the south of France, they’re not exactly tugging at the heartstrings either. A mere 10 minutes into Little White Lies (Les Petits Mouchoirs), and director Guillaume Canet (Ne le Dis à Personne) has already rendered just about all his characters unlikeable, and there’s another 140 minutes to go. This is the thing about Little White Lies: it’s a buddy film about a bunch of people you do not want to be buddies with. But that’s almost beside the point – the little white lies these adults tell one another and the grievances they gloss over are engrossing, and they are recognisable. The friend who won’t commit, the friend who won’t stop whingeing about his not-so-recent break-up, the friend who won’t relax. Until now, these friends have managed to avoid dealing with their flaws, but this is the holiday they’ll have to give their little white lies a rest. Little White Lies won’t bring you close to its characters, but you will laugh, you may cry, and you’ll keep watching – and at two and a half hours long, that’s no mean feat. (ST) ***1/2
