Nobody did Jean Faurez justice ; in the short space of five years ,he made several very interesting movies which possess strong appeal for fans of old French cinema: "service de nuit" (1943) "la fille aux yeux gris" (1945) "la vie en rose" (1947) ; "vire-vent " is his most intriguing one,and in its own way ,it stands with his best ;on the other hand,both his final efforts are almost worthless.With "vire-vent" , Faurez seems on Marcel Pagnol 's territory : a small village of Provence where the Donadieu family lives a happy lazy life,always taking it easy ;the father is convinced that there's a treasure buried in his land and he keeps on digging holes to no avail ; his daughters are free and easy ,one of them,Claire , will later refuse her mom's gift cause " I cannot wear white for my wedding ";and her sister loses her panties in the woods .Three spinsters comment on their life ,and on the village's life ,some kind of Greek Fates .The big event is the fete ; games , balls and provençal farandoles ,joy everywhere,never a thought for tomorrow, easy come easy go....till HE comes;it takes 30 minutes before the male lead (Roger Pigaut) appears ;he marries Claire Donadieu (Sophie Desmarets) -the wedding scene is not filmed ,that means a lot- : he 's a man from mountains , to many an intruder, an alien and he is different from this happy-go-lucky family unit ;for this pragmatic man, the treasure is not buried in the ground, it's wheat ,it's culture , it's work ,as poet La Fontaine wrote in his "le laboureur et ses enfants" fable .Paul Chapus imposes a new way of life based on work, effort and rigour , something of the Maréchal Pétain's ideology during the Occupation. A detail revealing a big malaise ,he's never called by his first name (Paul) but everyone ,including his wife , says "Chapus" ; all the villagers follow suit :he's Chapus, the killjoy, who rules his household with a rod of iron.But the Occupation days are fortunately over ,it's 1949 ,and the rebel family is not prepared to accept this iron discipline ;the clash is bound to happen. And it's the main originality of Faurez's work :he does not really take sides ,and the viewer does not either :after all ,Paul is a good-looking virtuous man ,who knows that the future is not ours to see ,that father Donadieu 's search for an imaginary treasure is pointless;on the other hand his family is not to blame either :after the hard years of 1940-44, their longing for pleasure and a carefree life is legitimate .Thus the ending is ambiguous ; is it a happy end? Is the very last scene so funny? Dark irony,more like!