Paris (CNN) Lengthy handshakes, warm embraces, cheek kisses and even a bit of grooming.

Emmanuel Macron and Donald Trump's bromance seemed to truly blossom on Tuesday. But for all the public display of affection between the two leaders in Washington, back in France, the reaction was a typical Gallic shrug and a certain dose of cynicism both on the streets of Paris and in the loftier circles of France's elites.

"It's just a battle of egos! Two great narcissists who adore themselves, they love themselves. It's all a communications strategy," Michel Onfray, one of France's most famous philosophers, told CNN.

Onfray said the real issues, like the Iran nuclear deal, could not be solved if egos and communications startegies mattered more than substance.

The real problem, he said, was not only the influence of Iran in the region and the battle between Sunnis and Shias, but the deeper question of how an age-old Persian culture dealt with a Gulf region built on a very different history.

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