Affleck wicked pissah filmmaker says the French

By Mary McSweeney Sep 6, 2007, 15:08 GMT

director and actor Ben Affleck (L) and his brother U.S. actor Casey Affleck pose during a photo-call to promote their movie \'Gone, Baby, Gone\' at the 33rd American Film Festival in Deauville, Normandy, France, 05 September 2007 . EPA/LUC SKEUDENER

This is a story I couldn't resist, being a North Shore girl and all.  According to the French, Boston boy Ben Affleck has hit one out of the pahhk with his latest, "Gone, Baby, Gone."

Ben Affleck tells the Boston Herald that the jokes about the home of Marshmallow Fluff, city of Lynn and Everett too, probably went over the têtes of Les Francais, but the made in Beantown film earned him standing ovations at its world premiere.

Children in Lynn, Massachusetts learn this nursery rhyme before anything by Mother Goose:

Lynn, Lynn, city of sin.
You never come out the way you went in.
The girls say no and then they give in.

“I was really nervous, and earlier in the day, I really panicked,” Ben shared with the Herald from Deauville, France.

“The French people don’t hide it if they hate your movie. They stand up and say, ‘This is (bleep!) I hate this movie!”

“It was the first time anyone saw it, and I didn’t know how the jokes about parties in Lynn being better than parties in Everett would play subtitled in French. Or the ones about stealing jet skis and going up to New Hampshire. But even if they didn’t get it, they still seemed to appreciate it.”

The Herald reports that “Gone, Baby, Gone” will premiere in Boston on Oct. 15 - four days before it opens nationwide. 

Ben told Herald reporters Gayle Fee and Laura Raposa that he couldn't wait to see the locals reaction.

“The people from Boston will definitely appreciate it more and get the few extra references,” he said.

Affleck noted that like “Good Will Hunting,” the Bostonian accents are wicked authentic.

“Some of the feedback we got from screenings in Europe was that the accent was hard to understand,” Ben said to the Herald.

“I was thinking about when I would watch ‘Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels’ and ‘Snatch’ and have to keep rewinding and rewinding to understand what they were saying.

This is Boston’s revenge for ‘Snatch.’ ”