A match made in heaven.
Le Gendarme se marie (The Gendarme Gets Married) is a 1968 French comedy film starring Louis de Funès and Michel Galabru, and the third installment of the Gendarme de Saint-Tropez series.
Cruchot (Louis de Funès) meets Josépha (Claude Gensac), the widow of a deceased General, and they quickly fall in love. But Cruchot's daughter (Geneviève Grad) doesn't like Josépha and is determined to prevent the wedding by all means necessary.
Le Gendarme se marie provides examples of:
- The '60s: This is a 1968 film. The music, the dance, the clothes are typical of that decade.
- Ambition Is Evil: Josépha convinces Cruchot to compete for a higher rank. When it is believed he has gotten it, he behaves badly towards his subordinates, especially Gerber.
- Back to School: Gerber and Cruchot passing an exam to get a higher rank provides a lot of funny childish situations: the revision with their wife and daughter; Cruchot trying to distract the other candidates during the exam; the gendarmes playing football during the break; Gerber spying on Cruchot's oral exam...
- Big Fancy House: Josépha's villa is huge and very nicely furnished and decorated.
- Boyfriend-Blocking Dad: Cruchot is very uncomfortable when he sees Nicole dancing with a boy in the nightclub.
- Bratty Teenage Daughter: Nicole, Cruchot's daughter, is determined to prevent her father's wedding. For example, she dresses herself like a little girl to ridicule her father in Josepha's eyes.
- Bring My Brown Pants: When Gerber tells Cruchot that the road hog he is shouting at is a colonel's widow and a friend of many influential people including President Charles de Gaulle, Cruchot wets himself.
- The Butcher: The gangster Frédo is nicknamed Le Boucher, i.e. "the butcher".
- Carload of Cool Kids: Cruchot is brought from one nightclub to another in one.
- Chase Scene: In the beginning, Cruchot chases Josépha, in order to fine her. In the end, he chases Frédo who has kidnapped Josépha.
- Classical Music Is Boring: Cruchot would like to watch a football game, but Josépha forces him to watch a classical music concert instead. He does not enjoy it.
- Convenient Escape Boat: Frédo jumps onto a departing boat with Josépha to escape from his pursuers at the end of the final chase.
- Damsel in Distress: Josépha is kidnapped by Frédo; Cruchot, the other gendarmes and even Nicole and her friends unite to deliver her.
- Drives Like Crazy:
- Josepha drives like crazy and Cruchot chases her to fine her.
- The nun Sister Clotilde helps Cruchot in the final chase. As usual in the series, she drives very dangerously.
- Electric Love: A big electric arc appears when Cruchot kisses Josépha's hand.
- Epic Fail: Gerber's plan for Cruchot to break up with Josépha. Eventually, they do not break up, but both Josépha and Madame Gerber are mad about him.
- Europeans Are Kinky: Scandinavians are kinky in the eyes of the Frenchmen. The two Swedish hitchhikers are very friendly with the gendarmes they meet.
- Evil Is Petty: Frédo le Boucher (the butcher) is for sure a dangerous criminal. Later in the film, he tries to stab a policeman, he kidnaps Josépha, and he plans to kill Cruchot, but he is first shown stealing cold cuts in a market.
- File Mixup: Cruchot and Gerber's tests get accidentally mixed, causing Cruchot to be promoted instead of Gerber. It lasts long enough for Cruchot to lord it over Gerber, before the latter can get his revenge when the mix-up is fixed.
- Flowers of Romance: Cruchot rides on a bike to his first date with Josépha and spontaneously steals a single pink rose for her. She likes it a lot.
- Glad I Thought of It:
- Inverted when Gerber helps Cruchot to break up with Josépha. When Gerber's plan fails, he tells Cruchot the plan was his.
- Played straight later: Gerber pretends the scuba-diving training was his idea, but it actually was Cruchot's and Gerber did not like the idea at all at first.
- Happily Ever After: the film ends with the wedding of Cruchot and Josépha.
- Henpecked Husband: Even before he marries her, Cruchot is dominated by Josépha. He is shown preparing food, while she goes shopping with Nicole. He cannot watch a football game and must watch a classical music concert instead. Josépha also forces him to compete for a higher rank and she trains him hard for it.
- Heroic BSoD: Cruchot has one when Gerber tells him that the road hog he is shouting at is a colonel's widow and a friend of many influential people including President Charles de Gaulle.
- Hypocritical Humor: Cruchot advising Gerber to stay modest, if one day he can access a high position.
- I Can't Dance: Cruchot cannot dance, but he has a dance lesson in order to go with Josépha to the nightclub because she loves dancing and invited him.
- Idle Rich: Josépha is rich and has no job. She spends her time on the French Riviera in the big villa of one of her friends.
- I Kiss Your Hand: When Cruchot kisses the hand of Josépha, electric sparks fly off — twice. Puzzled, Gerber wonders whether Cruchot is full of static electricity, and commands him to kiss his own hands to test it out, to no result. That's when the other gendarmes walk in...
- Incredibly Conspicuous Drag: Frédo disguises himself as a woman to escape from the police. His appearance remains very manly.
- Instant Convertible: Cruchot's car is cut off by a railway crossing arm during the final chase.
- Kids Play Match Breaker: Nicole Cruchot isn't exactly a kid anymore, but this is still at play, as she initially doesn't want her father to remarry until she gets to know Josépha better.
- Love at First Sight: Between Cruchot and Josépha. There are even electrical shocks when they touch each other.
- Meet Cute: When Cruchot meets Josépha, he begins shouting at her for her bad driving and threatens to fine her. Then Gerber tells him she is a very important person and Cruchot is very confused.
- Men Are Uncultured: Played for Laughs when Cruchot would like to watch a football game and Josépha forces him to watch a classical music concert instead.
- Mindlink Mates: Cruchot has a mental link with Josépha. When she is threatened by Frédo, he wakes up in the middle of the night and he knows she is in danger.
- Mistaken for Cheating: Gerber's wife thinks he has an affair with Josépha when she meet them together at the nightclub.
- Mistaken Identity: Cruchot thinks the unconscious body that he finds in Josépha's house is Josépha. It is actually Gerber.
- Parent with New Paramour: At first, Nicole does not like Josépha, Cruchot's new love interest, and especially the idea of her father getting married again and getting her a new mother. After Nicole and Josépha get to know each other, they get along so well that Cruchot wants to break up.
- Please Dump Me: Cruchot wants to break up with Josépha. Gerber advises him to make her think he cheats on her with other girls in a nightclub.
- Put on a Bus: At the end, Nicole marries one of her friends (although her love story was never mentioned previously). She is not seen again in the subsequent films.
- Ramp Jump: At the end of the final chase, Cruchot uses a car to jump from the pier onto the boat on which Frédo is trying to escape.
- Romancing the Widow: Cruchot charms Josépha, whose husband died 10 years ago.
- Screw the Rules, I Have Connections!: Josépha does not care much about traffic regulations, but she is the widow of a colonel of gendarmerie and a friend of many influential people, including President Charles de Gaulle.
- Sexy Scandinavian: The two Swedish hitchhikers are hot.
- Shameful Shrinking: After Cruchot is mistakenly given the rank of adjudant-chef, he spends his time humiliating his former superior, Gerber. Then, when the mistake is revealed, a vengeful Gerber starts berating Cruchot, who looks one meter tall during the whole scene.
- Status Quo Is God: Cruchot competes for a higher rank. He passes the exam, so he gets a higher rank and Gerber becomes his subordinate. Cruchot spends some time humiliating his former superior. Then it is revealed that there was a mistake in the results of the test: Cruchot actually failed it, while Gerber passed it. So Gerber becomes the superior of Cruchot again.
- Train Escape: Type 1 during the final chase. Subverted, because the pursuer, Cruchot, manages to go across the tracks with half of his car.
- Training Montage: When Cruchot and Gerber prepare for the exam.
- Vicariously Ambitious: Josépha is ambitious for Cruchot and convince him to compete for a higher rank.
- Ugly Guy, Hot Wife: Cruchot and Josépha, once they're married.
- The Usurper: Cruchot, when it is believed he replaced Gerber.
- Yes-Man: Fougasse towards Cruchot and Merlot towards Gerber, when it is believed Cruchot replaced Gerber.
- Zeerust: The computer which calculates the results of the exam.
