A Head for Business

A satirical examination of the transformation of a French investment bank into a Hollywood power broker, Le Sens des Affaires begins with a lowly bank clerk’s embezzlement of $104 million francs (about $14 million dollars) to finance his screen adaptation of Chekhov’s Three Sisters. The clerk, Gerard Dutillard, funnels bank funds into three fictional affiliates in a way that makes the bank’s president, Jean-Francois de Roquemorel, legally responsible. Financial ruin seems a distinct possibility, but Dutillard has worked out a plan to make the system work in his favor, and soon enough his banking superiors are doing their best to salvage his film and make it marketable, prompting actual investors to fuel the production with cash.