'Wahou!': A real estate comedy that can't close the deal - review

For most people, decisions involving real estate are the most significant financial choices of their entire lives. And, as anyone who has ever looked to rent an apartment or buy a home knows, it is a subject that can be endlessly engrossing, precisely because of its importance. I know that long after I had settled into my apartment, I couldn’t pass a real-estate office on the street without stopping to look at – and compare – prices, and I’m certain I’m not alone in this. 

So it’s interesting that it has rarely been the theme of movies, and on television, it is generally limited to cheesy reality shows.

But now there is a new movie, Wahou!, which is French for “Wow” and is the name of a real-estate agency, opening throughout Israel on November 23, that tackles this issue, and even if it isn’t a complete success, it does address a neglected topic. 

A new real estate movie hits Israeli theaters

Wahou!, which is directed by and stars Bruno Podalydes, tells a story in several chapters in which the real-estate brokers, clients, and sellers gradually reveal themselves. Yet it isn’t about people so much as properties, and it focuses on two main homes in what appears to be a comfortable, suburban area of France.

One is a house that is quite lovely but has some big drawbacks: It is right next to a busy suburban train line, it has an open space on an upper floor but no balustrade, the floorboards creak, etc. Worse, there is a couple who live there, who are supposedly moving on happily with their new, empty-nest life and are moving to the seashore, but never seem to leave the place, when it is being shown. Eventually, they even bond with some of the prospective buyers. 

The husband, Gerard (Patrick Ligardes), is depicted as a lovable grump who gets angry whenever interested clients talk about tearing down walls in his precious domicile. His wife, Sylvette (Sabrine Azema) is a wise woman who has found a way to live with him, and advises a potential buyer on how to handle her cantankerous and entitled husband. 

THE SECOND is a two-bedroom apartment near the center of town. A young couple, just at the beginning of their relationship, are shown it by mistake. They were meant to see a much smaller place, but when the father (Roschdy Zem) of the young man arrives – their parents are bankrolling the apartment for them – he assumes his son’s girlfriend is pregnant and is delighted. 

Another yuppie couple, with bikes that fold up really well, show up but don’t get much of a tour before Catherine (Karin Viard, best known for The Belier Family), the agent, falls apart, talking about the death from cancer of her longtime partner. Jim (Victor Lefebvre), the intern at the real-estate firm, brings his girlfriend to the empty apartment for a tryst just as the agent, Oracio (Bruno Podalydes), turns up to show the place to a nurse and her ailing mother. And so on. 

At the beginning, you think that the movie is going to be about Oracio and Catherine, who I assumed at first were a couple, but in the end, you learn that they barely know each other, although they work for the same firm. While there are some terrific actors here, much of the movie is anti-climactic. 

There are a few insights here and there, such as when Sylvette says, “Everybody’s allowed to be an owner,” and Catherine replies, “Yes, but does it bring happiness? I think we’re all tenants. We own nothing. Our homes outlive us. We borrow for a moment but possess nothing,” which is the movie’s message, if it has one. 

But later, when Jim notes that he has read that many real-estate agents faced abandonment issues in their childhood, Oracio confirms this, saying, “All real estate agents had a feeling of abandonment as children... Our aim, deep down, is not just to make money. It is to house people,” which was not exactly my impression when I was looking for a place. 

All in all, Wahou! has enjoyable moments, but it would be more suitable as a streaming choice than a movie you would want to fork out money for at a theater.