Incredible but True (French: Incroyable mais vrai) is a 2022 comedy directed by Quentin Dupieux.
Alain (Alain Chabat) and Marie (Léa Drucker) are an aging couple with no children. They buy a house that includes a mysterious trapdoor in the basement. That also makes them neighboors with Gérard (Benoît Magimel) who happens to be Alain's boss.
The trapdoor has some supernatural features, and Alain and Marie conflict over using it. Meanwhile Gérard has some very personal issues that he insists on involving Alain with.
This film provides examples of:
- Age Insecurity: Marie is very unhappy about being aging, and obsesses over it.
- Compensating for Something: Played with. Gérard has an electronic penis, that he had his own replaced with in Japan. He is very proud of this. Mid-Life Crisis Car also seems to be involved.
- Only Sane Man: Zig-zagged. Alain does a few weird things, but he keeps being practical and tries to have the other characters act normal. He would be happy with having a mysterious trapdoor with supernatural features in the basement and not use it. Could be viewed as Only Sane Employee when his boss Gérard acts foolish, but in fact his colleagues don't really appear in the film.
- Read the Freaking Manual: As things go bad due to overusing the trapdoor, Alain confronts the man who sold him the house. He claims that obviously that would be dangerous, as was stated in the buying act (but Alain didn't read that part). This may be a case of Artistic License – Law, as normally when buying a house in France the notary would warn the buyer of dangers (and in this case the seller didn't hide them).
