This Friday (December 18), French-Swiss director Ursula Meier's debut feature, HOME, opens in New York and Los Angeles. We heartily recommend you getting out of the house to see this comedy about a family trying to hang onto their own home.

The movie opens with a family of five playing a night-time hockey game on a deserted superhighway that runs past the front of their property. The highway hasn't been in use for years, and the family has annexed the space. Furniture and toys litter the road. The oldest sister spends her free time sunbathing nearby. The young boy rides his bicycle madly up and down the empty expanse. The mail box and school bus are on the opposite side of the freeway, but it's not a problem, since there are no cars to worry about, ever.

Until, of course, the government repaves and reopens the road. Suddenly, thousands of cars are zipping by the family's home, creating a roar that keeps the family up all night. Traffic jams turn their front yard into a tourist carnival, with drivers gawking at the eldest, who refuses to give up her sunbathing habit. The younger daughter, certain that the poisonous car exhaust will kill the family, maintains a state of complete vigilance. The family starts to fray around the edges. As they loose their sanity, they start walling themselves in, trying to escape the invasion of traffic by disappearing into their home.

Meier is a sly director, letting the warmth and casual grace of the family show through, while quietly hinting that the family might be a little too close for comfort. Bunuel's EXTERMINATING ANGEL comes to mind, as well as the French cinematic preoccupation with traffic -- Godard's WEEKEND and Tati's TRAFIC, for example. Experienced cinematographer Agnès Godard brings an equally light touch to the task.

Isabelle Huppert plays the mother of the family, moving from carefree to paranoid as the world imposes on her castle. Olivier Gourmet, the father, may be recognized by arthouse audiences for his previous roles in LA PROMESSE, THE SON and TIME OF THE WOLF. Newcomers Adélaïde Leroux, Madeleine Budd and Kacey Mottet Klein round out the cast.

"A confident, appealingly bizarre theatrical debut," says Andrew Shenker in the VILLAGE VOICE. "The talented Ms. Meier has a particularly generous appreciation for the human comedy," concludes NEW YORK TIME's Manohla Dargis.