The Wedding Banquet/Garçon d'honneur

Best Man 

I don't know why I was having a conversation about Ang Lee with a friend and I realised that I was meant to watch The Wedding Banquet again for a while but I have not had the chance yet: I really liked the film when I first saw it, and that was what made Lee a director to watch in my book.

The Wedding Banquet is the story of a gay Taiwanese-American man in a happy relationship who agrees to marry a woman to provide her with a green card. All things would be well if the groom's parents didn't decide to come and visit.

This, despite being a comedy, broaches themes such as same sex relationships, cross-cultural/multi-racial ones as well and generation gaps (traditional groom's family's expectations vs modern groom's life style). And I remember it being a very funny film as well. (I'd give it a Yay! if that was the point here).
I asked one of my Chinese speaking friends what the original title "喜宴" would translate to in English as I was a bit curious and he replied "happy banquet or wedding banquet".
The French title for the film is "Garçon d'honneur" which sort of translates back to "best man".

The best translation for a "best man" is "un témoin", which was accurately done with another film, the 2005 rom-com "The Best Man" which French title is  "Le témoin du marié". 

This was the best possible translation as, contrary to the best man where you know it's about a guy friend of the groom, "un témoin" is gender neutral. But why not just go for a plain and simple "témoin" as it can never be "la témoin" anyway? Maybe having to specify that it was the groom's friend must have felt like a necessity. Beats me.

Which brings me back to The Wedding Banquet. No, it doesn't but I needed to get back to my topic.
I said that "Garçon d'honneur" sort of translated back to "best man" - sort of because I have never heard of the expression being used. Demoiselle d'honneur (Bridesmaid) on the other hand...

Maybe that's their big wink wink joke here: that as it's a gay relationship, and the guy who is the best man at the green card wedding is also the groom's boyfriend - or girlfriend from the looks of it.

I'll just give them the benefit of the doubt and pretend they didn't really think this through. Believing that they did bring questions I don't really want to ask...