Most locals in Budapest consider the constant stream of foreign stag parties - who come to the city for a lost weekend - an annoyance at best. But French film-maker Xavier Gens, and writers Manu Payet and Simon Moutairou, took the theme as inspiration. The French film Budapest, released in 2018, follows the adventures of two young French men who drop out of the corporate world to move to Budapest and open a tour company that caters to stag parties.

Wikipedia summarizes the plot as follows: Vincent and Arnaud are two best friends who once studied at the largest French business school. But today, they are very unhappy at their respective workplaces: Vincent works for a multinational corporation where he has no recognition, while Arnaud flounders at a firm run by his wife's father. During their friend's bachelor party, they meet a stripper. The latter tells them about her Hungarian hometown of Budapest, its nightlife, and its countless beautiful women. Lamenting over how their bachelor party should have been held there instead, Arnaud then comes up with the idea of creating a travel agency in partnership with Vincent that would organize getaway trips for French bachelor parties in Budapest: a city filled with oversized nightclubs where alcohol flows freely.

While it’s hard to say that the film goes far beyond pandering to Eastern European stereotypes, it does at least make British stag parties look tame. Along they way, there are some generous shots of Budapest’s great locations, including the Bazilika and Széchenyi thermal baths.

While its sense of humor may be a bit juvenile, the film Budapest does exploit some of the aspects of the city that more serious films pass over: the seedy nightlife, the low-rent tourism of the ‘Party District’ in central Budapest. In this way it’s not much different from films like The Hangover, which are like of like teen comedies for grownups. And to its credit, filmed before the pandemic lockdowns, Budapest may have even captured a kind of contemporary nostalgia.

Available on French Netflix, and on Youtube, Budapest got mixed reviews, but in the end — while not the best cinematic postcard of the city — still reinforces Budapest’s place in the popular imagination: as a location where anything can happen, and you can make your dreams come true. Even if that dream is a weekend of debauchery. The trailer with English language subtitles is watchable below:

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