A hotel clerk searches all over Le Havre for the fairy who made two of his three wishes come true before disappearing.
Not all of the jokes land perfectly (a late telephone gag treads too much water), but The Fairy remains infectiously funny throughout.
It's meticulously slight: every setup – whether involving life-threatening ketchup bottles or sausage-snatching migrants – yields its own minor rewards.
Never brilliant in any single aspect, but you’d happily join them for another madcap adventure.
If you take to it, you'll find the fairy dust positively sparkles – however visibly it's bargain-basement tinsel.
The best that can be said for The Fairy is that it certainly creates its own world. However, it's one I wanted to get out of almost as soon as it began.
It’s simultaneously a very knowing and strangely innocent film: either way it’s hard to resist at least an inward smile while watching Abel and Gordon perform an underwater ballet sequence in costumes fashioned from seaweed.
If your wish is for a very gentle piece of Belgian whimsy, consider it granted.
Largely plotless, the film serves up a series of droll, slapstick set-pieces, your enjoyment of which will largely be determined by how adorable you find the prospect of watching a couple of kooks dancing at the bottom of the sea amid giant oysters and jellyfish.
Dundee Contemporary Arts, Dundee from Friday July 20, 2012, until Sunday July 22, 2012. More info: www.dca.org.uk
Edinburgh Filmhouse, Edinburgh from Friday July 27, 2012, until Monday July 30, 2012. More info: www.filmhousecinema.com
Glasgow Film Theatre, Glasgow from Friday July 27, 2012, until Sunday July 29, 2012. More info: http://www.glasgowfilm.org/theatre/