Incredible But True

Buying a house is usually a boring saga of interest rates and checking for mold, but in a Quentin Dupieux film, the real estate agent’s "one weird catch" isn't a leaky roof—it’s a temporal rift in the basement. I sat down to watch Incredible But True (2022) while nursing a cup of lukewarm peppermint tea that I’d forgotten about for twenty minutes, and honestly, that mild disorientation was the perfect headspace for this movie. It’s a slim, 74-minute French comedy that manages to be more provocative than most three-hour "prestige" dramas released in the last five years.

The premise is pure Dupieux (the madman behind the sentient tire in Rubber and the giant fly in Mandibles). Alain Chabat, playing a quiet, slightly weary everyman named Alain, moves into a suburban home with his wife Marie, played with escalating intensity by Léa Drucker. The house contains a duct in the basement. If you climb down, you emerge back in the house twelve hours later, but you’ve only experienced a few minutes of transit—and you’re three days younger. It’s a literal fountain of youth with a hefty "time tax" attached.

The High Cost of Biological Hacking

While Alain is content to just enjoy his new quiet life, Marie becomes addicted to the duct. It’s a sharp, contemporary satire on our current obsession with "bio-hacking" and the desperate, often grotesque pursuit of anti-aging. In an era where tech billionaires are literally injecting themselves with the blood of teenagers, Marie’s descent into basement-dwelling obsession feels uncomfortably relevant. Dupieux doesn't give us a grand sci-fi explanation; he just shows us the pathetic reality of a woman willing to lose years of her life just to look like Roxane Arnal (the 19-year-old version of Marie) again.

The film's secondary plot is where the "comedy" part of the genre tag really earns its keep. Alain’s boss, Gérard (Benoît Magimel), reveals that he has replaced his manhood with a high-tech electronic prosthetic controlled by a smartphone app. Benoît Magimel is doing some of the best physical comedy of his career here, playing a man who is so insecure about his masculinity that he’s literally turned himself into a glitchy gadget. The scene where he tries to demonstrate the "vibration modes" at a dinner party is a masterclass in cringe-inducing deadpan.

Independent Ingenuity on a Clock

What I love about this film, and what makes it a standout "indie gem" of the early 2020s, is the sheer efficiency of the production. Dupieux is the ultimate DIY auteur—he directed, wrote, shot, and edited the film himself. It was shot in just a few weeks during the tail end of the pandemic era, and you can feel that contained, slightly claustrophobic energy. Most directors would have taken this $4.3 million budget and tried to make a sprawling epic; Dupieux used it to make a tight, punchy fable that refuses to overstay its welcome.

There’s a specific kind of freedom in independent cinema that allows for a joke like "the bionic penis" to sit right next to a heartbreaking montage about the passage of time. Apparently, the film was shot almost entirely in sequence, which helped Léa Drucker map out Marie's psychological (and physical) transformation. You can see the grime and the obsession growing on her, a stark contrast to Alain Chabat’s increasingly baffled "dad energy."

Interestingly, the film premiered at the 72nd Berlin International Film Festival, where it baffled critics who were expecting something more traditionally "French." But that’s the joy of Popcornizer favorites—they don't fit into the boxes. Quentin Dupieux is the only director making movies for people with severe ADHD who also happen to love existential dread. He understands that in the 2020s, our attention spans are fried, and our fear of death is at an all-time high. Why not make a movie that addresses both in under 80 minutes?

The Rhythm of the Absurd

The comedic timing here isn't about punchlines; it’s about the silence between the weirdness. When Gérard’s remote control starts malfunctioning, or when Alain realizes his wife has spent weeks in a hole in the floor, the camera just lingers. It trusts the audience to find the horror in the humor. The score, which leans into that retro-electronic vibe Dupieux (aka Mr. Oizo) is known for, keeps the pace humming even when the plot intentionally begins to cannibalize itself.

It’s worth noting that the film's box office didn't set the world on fire—it’s a weird, subtitled French movie about time-travel ducts and robot genitals—but its life on streaming platforms has been its true "second act." It’s the kind of movie you find at midnight on a Tuesday and immediately text your three weirdest friends about. It doesn't need a franchise; it doesn't need a "cinematic universe." It just needs a basement and a dream.

Incredible But True is a lean, mean, absurdist machine that manages to say more about the human condition than most movies twice its length. It’s a perfect example of why we need independent voices who aren't afraid to be profoundly silly while staring into the abyss. If you’ve ever looked in the mirror and wished you could just "reset" a few years, this movie is a hilarious, cautionary reminder to be careful which hole you crawl into. It’s short, strange, and stays with you long after the credits roll.