The avenging "Tobacco Force" group of crime fighters is struggling to function. After many years of combating enemy beasties using their superpowers - the chemicals that, when combined, cause cancer - they are all just falling out of synch. This has not escaped the notice of their ferret-like boss "Chef Didier" who sends them all to a remote retreat where they are to work on their teamwork skills. Around the camp fire, one decides to regale the others with his most terrifying story - and thereafter, one by one, they proceed to outdo each other with increasingly incredulous stories whilst the two women of the group - "Nicotine" (Anaïs Demoustier) and "Ammoniaque" (Oulaya Amamra) pine over the spurned affections of their really pretty revolting, dribbling, boss (anyone remember "Roland Rat"?). For a while it's quite quirkily entertaining, this film - but after about half an hour the joke has worn thin, the pace drops off and the whole thing just loses it's way. It is original - at times it reminded me a little of "Galaxy Quest" (1999), and clearly there is a warning against using the dreaded weed, but Quentin Dupieux didn't really have enough material to sustain this - even for eighty minutes. That said, it is still worth a watch and there are occasions when it made me smile - just not enough of them - and on the telly will do fine.

Quentin Dupieux... Love him or hate him, you love him.

Smoking Causes Coughing is like eating food you find on a bus station bench in a strange town at 4am, and why wouldn't you?

Like that dumpster dived dinner, Dupieux's annual delirium this year comes in bits and pieces.

At 80 minutes long, not only does Smoking Causes Coughing continue his trend of medium-length features but, as it's an anthology film, is even more concise than his last movie, Incredible But True, which clocked in at 74 minutes.

The vignettes seem to suit him, though, and each individual story is wholly entertaining, contrary to most anthology films.

The titular longer work, which serves as the framing device for the rest of the shorts, revolves around Tobacco Force, a Power Ranger-esque group of super heroes (Mercury, Benzene, Ammonia, Nicotine, and Methanol) who swap 'creepy' stories while away on a team building retreat.

The tales they tell are just as quirky and off-beat as you'd expect from Dupieux, and include a cast of repeat offenders from his other films (Alain Chabat, Anaïs Demoustier, Adèle Exarchopoulos...) as well as some welcome new faces (Gilles Lellouche, Jean-Pascal Zadi, Doria Tillier).

Like a deep drag on a menthol cigarette, Smoking Causes Coughing is a breath of fresh air.