Les Visiteurs

Les Visiteurs
Theatrical release poster
Directed byJean-Marie Poiré
Written byJean-Marie Poiré
Christian Clavier
Produced byAlain Terzian
Starring
CinematographyJean-Yves Le Mener
Edited byCatherine Kelber
Music byEric Lévi (Era)
Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy
Production
company
Distributed byGaumont Buena Vista International
Release date
  • 27 January 1993 (1993-01-27)
Running time
107 minutes
CountryFrance
LanguageFrench
Budget$9.5 million
Box office$98.8 million

Les Visiteurs (French pronunciation: [le vizitœʁ]; English: The Visitors) is a 1993 French fantasy comedy film directed by Jean-Marie Poiré. It stars the duo of Christian Clavier and Jean Reno, and Valérie Lemercier. It also features Marie-Anne Chazel, Christian Bujeau, Isabelle Nanty and Didier Pain in supporting roles. In the film, a 12th-century knight and his squire travel in time to the end of the 20th century and find themselves adrift in modern society.

Les Visiteurs was the highest-grossing film in France in 1993 and remains one of the highest-grossing films in the country today. The publicity for the film used the tagline Ils ne sont pas nés d'hier ("They weren't born yesterday"). After its box office success, the film was nominated eight times for the 19th César Awards. It won the César for Best Supporting Actress, awarded to Valérie Lemercier. The success of the film and its cliffhanger ending led to a sequel, The Visitors 2: The Corridors of Time, which was itself followed by a third film, The Visitors: Bastille Day, forming a trilogy, entirely produced by Jean-Marie Poiré. The film also has an English-language remake Just Visiting. The castle of Ermenonville in the Oise département served as the set for the castle of Montmirail in the modern day and the Cité de Carcassonne for the medieval castle.