Just Visiting

Updated June 26, 2020 | Infoplease Staff

Whereas American films get exported all over the world with amazing speed and hearty reception, only art-house foreign cinema makes it to the States. No imported pop. One of the strange side-effects of this phenomenon is that French blockbusters often get remade into American movies (3 Men and a Baby, , The Birdcage, Point of No Return, etc). Just Visiting is one such film.

French actors Jean Reno and Christian Clavier return to their original roles: a 12th century nobleman and his servant who get catapulted into the late 20th century by a wizard's wayward spell. Christina Applegate plays the lord's medieval love interest and distant American descendent, whose house Count Thibault (Reno) and Andre (Clavier) promptly wreck due to several centuries of culture shock.

The intelligent class commentary so common to French films has of course been excised from the script. But the original's ribald humor remains intact. With its physical gags and scatological silliness, Just Visiting seamlessly Americanizes into a forgettable comedy.