How the film "The Gendarme and the Aliens" was filmed: stills from the set and 11 interesting facts about the film (16 photos)

The comedy "The Gendarme and the Aliens" (1979) is the fifth and penultimate film in the famous series about gendarmes with Louis de Funes in the leading role. In the late 70s, science fiction and the theme of aliens became widely popular, so it was decided to dedicate the new film about gendarmes to this topic.





1. After the success of George Lucas's Star Wars IV: A New Hope and Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Louis de Funes, impressed by these films, decided that the next film about the gendarmes should definitely be connected with aliens.



Upon learning that CNC was going to make a new film about aliens, and with Louis de Funes in the lead role, German distributors immediately allocated 1 billion French francs for the filming.

2. Louis de Funes (Cruchot) and Michel Galabru (Gerber) returned to the leading roles. But the rest of the cast underwent major changes.





Christian Morin and Jean Lefebvre

For example, Jean Lefebvre (Fougasse) and Christian Morin (Merlot) were removed from the film, replacing them with Maurice Riche (Beaulieu) and Jean-Pierre Ramball (Taupin). And if Christian Morin left of his own free will, Lefebvre was simply removed from the film.



Jean Maurice and Jean-Pierre Ramball

The main reason for this was his conflict with the director Jean Géraud, as well as with some actors, in particular with Louis de Funes himself. That is why in the two previous films he was given much less time than before.



Lefebvre himself was shocked by the news that he would not be in the next film. And according to him, it was very painful for him to see that the next film was being shot without his participation.

3. Also, the actress Claude Gensac, who had previously played Cruchot's wife, did not participate in the film. Yes, she was supposed to appear in this film, but it did not work out due to her theatrical activities. The fact is that Claude Gensac was simultaneously participating in theatrical productions, and literally a few days before the start of filming, the theater director forbade her to act in films at the same time, threatening to fire her. Therefore, she had to refuse the role of Josepha.



Instead of her, the actress Maria Mauban was cast as Cruchot's wife, significantly reducing the character's appearance in the film.



However, in the next (last) film "The Gendarme and the Gendarmettes" Claude Gensac returned to the role of Josepha.

4. Louis de Funes dreamed of having a flying saucer like the one he saw in Close Encounters of the Third Kind in the film.



As a result, the company "Matra", which specialized in automobiles and the aerospace industry, took on the development of the flying saucer for the film. And a separate person was hired to supervise the construction of the saucer - an expert in the field of UFOs, who claimed to have seen a flying saucer with his own eyes.

5. In total, two flying saucers were created for the film. One was created in life size, and the second was a smaller copy with a diameter of just over a meter. A miniature duplicate of the plate was needed for filming the scene of the UFO falling into the water.



6. Louis de Funes was involved in the filming process like no one else, so he not only played his role, but also often suggested some of his own innovations that were not in the script. Moreover, Funes repeatedly ran the filming process itself, giving instructions to the actors and setting them on the right wave. 7. Artists and carpenters built most of the scenery from scratch. The restaurant alone, which is destroyed by aliens, took a month to rebuild.



8. Many viewers know actor Lambert Wilson from the Matrix series, where he played the Merovingian. But the actor started with the film The Gendarme and the Aliens, where he played one of the aliens who destroyed the restaurant I mentioned earlier.



9. During the filming of the movie, a terrible tragedy occurred, which resulted in the deaths of several people. The scene with the car stunt involving Cruchot's wife was filmed in the last week of shooting. The director himself was absent from the filming of this scene, as he was busy filming other scenes. As a result, the scene with this stunt was filmed under the supervision of another team.



According to the director's idea, the cars were supposed to drive at normal speed, and then the whole scene was supposed to be sped up during editing. But the female stuntwoman who was driving lost control and drove into a crowd of standing people at high speed. As a result, two people died and another 10 were injured, receiving injuries of varying severity.

After this tragic incident, ordinary viewers hated everyone involved in the filming of this movie. The remaining scenes had to be filmed in a neighboring town in a rather gloomy atmosphere, because this tragedy left no one indifferent.



The stuntwoman herself got off with a fine of 2,000 francs. And the producers took on the costs of compensating the relatives of the victims, as well as the treatment of the injured.

10. In 1979, the film "The Gendarme and the Aliens" was released, surpassing the films "Apocalypse Now" and "Moonraker" (about James Bond) in terms of ticket sales. There was literally no end to the audience. The film only came to the USSR in 1981.



11. After the incredible success of the film, Louis de Funes seriously thought about making a sequel. He even came up with the title "The Gendarme and the Revenge of the Aliens".

The sequel was supposed to be full of effects and stunts, and the main action of the film was supposed to take place in space and on another planet, where the aliens would bring a brigade of gendarmes.



Also, Funes thought about the planet they would end up on being populated entirely by beautiful women. For this purpose, a separate casting was even held, where beautiful girls were asked to send their full-length photos.

In the meantime, Louis de Funes and Jean Giraud decided to take on the film adaptation of the novel "Cabbage Soup" by René Fallet, which also touched on the topic of aliens. The role of the alien itself was played by Maurice Riche, who played one of the gendarmes.

But when the film "Cabbage Soup" was released in 1981, and it was time to return to the theme of the gendarmes, Funes and Giraud decided that the audience should not be stuffed with films about aliens in such quantities, so they decided to abandon the idea with aliens.

However, they decided not to abandon the idea of ​​making a film with beautiful girls at the center of the plot, so the next (last) film in the series about the gendarmes was dedicated to female gendarmes.