Guess Who Is Calling?

Also part of the ensemble casts from this year’s Rendez-Vous selections Meteors and Love Me Tender, prodigiously talented newcomer Salif Cissé takes center stage in this wry comedy from Fabienne Godet (Lifelines, Rendez-Vous 2021), opposite established French legend Denis Podalydès. Baptiste (Cissé) works as a pet insurance telephone salesman by day, while at night he hones his impression-heavy stand-up act. After one show, impressed novelist Pierre (Podalydès) approaches, and soon the two have developed a new arrangement: Baptiste will take possession of Pierre’s smartphone, and answer any incoming calls and texts in character as Pierre himself, thereby sparing him the hassle of maintaining his unwieldy personal and professional communications and leaving him to work on his latest writing project in peace. Of course, no such seemingly simple plan can go smoothly—but rather than descending into frantic, caustic farce, Guess Who Is Calling? foregrounds the two men’s unlikely friendship with warmth, playfulness, and good humor.