Purporting to be the account of a real life incident when the controversial author went AWOL on a book tour, The Kidnapping of Michel Houellebecq features Michel Houellebecq playing Michel Houellebecq, who is taken captive in a clumsy kidnapping and ultimately gives his captors more grief than he’s worth.

Guillaume Nicloux’s film is a droll, inventive and unconventional caper, with its subject a surprisingly engaging presence at the centre of it. Houellebecq’s performance seems too natural to be anything of the sort, and his sly, self-parodic turn illustrates that he is an artist with a sense of humour that is frequently overlooked. (MH)

Forum Section, Berlin International Film Festival 2014

Director’s Note: Fantastic, hilarious, comic, mundane and absurd, between documentary and fiction – how can we know what is real?

Showing as part of the Carte Noire IFI French Film Festival 2014 (November 19th – 30th).