February 2010

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I have to say I like receiving clips in my email - especially when they're as good as this. Sarko is a film made by Karl Zéro, a political satirist who appears on BFM TV. It covers the first year of our President's reign, and it's wonderfully funny

Echappées belles is France 5's out-and-about programme, meeting people from the sticks. This episode is Finistère, and the local Tourist Board was clearly involved. Lots of spooky atmosphere, but at least at the end we get an interview with a Breton who speaks quite fast and gives the ear some work to do.

When I started this site in July 2009, I included a first clip from this wonderful documentary on Mariyln Monroe and promised a second. I remain fascinated by the relation between America and France. We British are supposed (according to the French) to be hand in glove with the Americans, whom they distrust as capitalists. But the France-America relationship is cultural : books, films, philosophy, the Statue of Liberty, the modern democratic republic.

This evening news piece is about Chinese students paying for diplomas from French schools. Question for discussion in class (for a Diploma in Applied Cynicism).  Why didn't French TV News raise a hoo-hah about the University of Toulon a year ago when the story broke ?

A great pleasure, this. France 3 screened the excellent BBC adaptation of David Copperfield. It works wonderfully in French. Dickens' style always seems to me rather laboured, very Victorian, and it is replaced here by a much more natural French. And of course, the sentiment of solidarity and fraternity...

This TF1 news enquiry into the way our rich societies waste food is not only interesting in itself - it poses a very difficult listening exercise.

Here is one of these irresistible programs where a journalist takes the mad ramblings of a medieval monk, combines them with the mad ramblings of people who leave their mark on the Internet, in order to predict the end of the world in 2012. It may be the end of the world for French Socialists if Nicolas Sarkozy wins the election in that year, but I predict a second mandate for my favourite President.

I think the Comment c'est fait series on the Discovery channel (which sadly I don't get with my subscription) is one of the best listening exercises I have come across. The drawback is that you have to be interested in matters technical, and female members of my family have been known to shake their heads sadly at the idea that anyone would want to watch something being made rather than seeing it attractively displayed on a shelf in a shop.

Art, the surrealist comedy of Yasmina Reza, was screened on France 2 on the death of one of the actors, Pierre Vaneck. I put it on the sonsenfrancais site, but here it is with subtitles

The quality of the TF1 evening news 'enquiries' is quite remarkable. At the end of the film, just look at the number of staff involved in these five minute productions. Most TV companies manage to field a cameraman, a sound engineer and the front-man. And these little films d'auteur are so well-structured. This is a particularly good one on the dangerous games involving hanging, suffocating and other dangerous pleasures to which children have always been attracted, but which in our society are more and more unacceptable

A documentary on a subject which Anglosaxons regard as very French - Le crime passionnel. In this extract it is described as le crime des gens ordinaires. An interesting difference of viewpoint

This next extract is from a progamme called 8 Journalistes en colère, which I had assumed would feature journalists complaining about their pay or conditions of work. But no, happily they were talking about journalism. So you have a nice set of editorials delivered to camera

I often look for discussions that I can quote on this site, but political discussions have no lasting interest, and others - such as the famous Bibliothèque Medicis are intellectually heavy going (for me, I mean), So here is a discussion that followed a documentary on Winston Churchill. What amuses me about discussions (irrespective of the country or the language) is the silly things highly intelligent people say when they are speaking extempore. I treasure the guy who says 'It was just as well for Churchill that he didn't die in 1938' . Well, yes. It was just as well for the free world.

A very pleasant documentary here, on Michèle Morgan, great actress of the French screen.

I missed this excellent documentary on Arte on the effects of bad journalism and hysteria on public opinion, so I am grateful to the person who sent me it. So much nonsense is talked in the name of the Principle of Precaution, from telephone relays to - dare I even suggest it - global warming. And whe it results in medical professionals being frightened to take their own medicine...

Pure pleasure, this. A clip from a Michel Leeb stage show Qu'est-ce aue sexe ? I've put it on sonsenfrancais.org, but as always with a very clear comedy sketch, I reference it here and add a subtitle file. Enjoy.

When I started these two sites I promised myself that I would never put up clips about the environment or global warming. I spent too many years in French classes where it was the only subject we ever talked about - because safe and inoffensive. But this one, Les temps changent is quite nicely done and makes a good example of the entry level of this site

TF1's evening news pondered on the great question posed by an American in the 18th century, I think, It is a great question whether a government strong enough to defend itself be not too strong for the liberty of its citizens

Here is a lovely version of Peter Pan. A realistic evocation of childhood - children were just as rumbustious in Victorian times as they are now, the fantasy world of Captain Hook, and the far more terrifying Aunt Millicent. My sincere thanks to the person who sent me the clip.

The channel Toute l'histoire gave us a well-researched documentary on the French system of garde-à-vue. The British equivalent always amuses me. Our newspapers say that someone is helping the police with their enquiries.

Arte Télévision searches out unusual and innovative television programmes from all over Europe, and British television never fails to provide odd examples. Such is Les Flingueuses, a better title than the original Suburban Shootout. It's a very funny series.

Here I am, breaking my rule not to have clips that deal with global warming or environmental issues. However, I thought when I started recording that this would be about animals and not biodiversity (just as you might think Thalassa would be about the wonders of the sea and not always about pollution). It's the unremitting brain-washing that worries me. But it's a good piece, although the people who still don't like the way animals are treated in zoos get my vote. If, one day, the only tigers left are those in captivity in zoos, are we really any better off ?

Here is the introduction and close of Laurence Piquet's documentary on those who collect Art with a capital A. Two gentlemen who spout ineffable nonsense for the five minutes of the clip. Why include it ? Because they speak quite clearly but quite fast, because the content is vague and therefore sometimes difficult to pick up. Anyway, I love Laurence Piquets's voice.

From the world of High Art, to a very very good American film indeed. The Bicentennial Man, one of these rare films which improves on the original, written by Isaac Asimov. The robot, Andrew, is played by America's greatest comic actor, Robin Williams. And I don't care how often I repeat it, this is exactly  what anglophone students of French need to watch.

From a superb American film to a really awful version of Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility.  Arte screened it, presumably because it has Hugh Grant and Emma Thompson in it. Why include it here ? Because the mannered early nineteenth century style of speech translates so well into French.

We tend only to know the history of our own country, so I was interested by this story of Vercingétorix, whom we think of as the cartoon character, rather than as the great chief of the Gaulois who fought against Caesar. A nice piece, this

I enthuse about France Télévision's flagship documentart Des Racines et des ailes often enough for it to get boring, I suppose, but this number, on the right bank of Paris was superb. Here is a section on the Théâtre des Boulevards,  the famous Boulevard du Crime that we see in Carnet's film Les enfants du Paradis. Wonderful.

I was nasty about Laurent Piquet's arts programme Un soir au musée above, so let's make amends with an excellent documentary the following week on Turner

The little films of investigative journalism in the TF1 evening news are always well-researched and interesting. Here is one on the possible dangers of synthetic sugar. Interesting, the expert who says that the only way to assess the possible dangers of a product is to put it on the market, and then see what it does to people !

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