> It’s the cheapest way to build effective drama, but if you don’t fully dissolve yourself in the movie logic, the whole time you want to scream, “can’t anyone just talk about what’s happening directly?!”

Yup it's insane. At the end of a very long series of three movies I told my father: "OK so this all basically happened because the person who sent the letter considered the (snail) mail service to be flawless and didn't bother to make sure the recipient got the letter in the first place".

Doesn't matter which (french) movies: some dumb plot where relatives don't know they're relatives because the only person who knew didn't bother to make sure the letter explaining they were relatives arrived.

Not naming the movies otherwise we'll get nitpicking.

TFA is right: it happens all the time in movie plots and really doesn't help with the suspension of disbelief.