Clips organised by level
Level 3
Page 3
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Il ne faut jurer de rien, was a splendid historical romp starring Jean Dujardin, one of my favourite actors. Normally historical dramas are easy to follow - formal language and moderately paced. Although the language is formal, here the diction is very modern and just as difficult to follow as a modern film This is also the first video that I am uploading to YouTube, rather than to this site. The text and the mp3 file are available for download as before
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Here's a charming little piece on Charles Trenet. We normally hear the sentimental ballades such as Douce France, but here is the entertainer, the singer of patter songs. You'll need the subtitles for much of this. And I can't tell you how long it took me to catch the words "L'élève revête un harnachement spécial" Sometimes it just doesn't come....
I try to keep the standard here at a reasonable level, but if a video extract interests me I tend to throw caution to the winds... This was a programme in the Empreintes series, interviewing the actor Fabrice Luchini. I like him as an actor, and he is a great admirer of Louis Ferdinand Céline, as I am. But he is eccentric and enthusiastic, and he talks fast. Very fast. Add to that a contribution from the widow of Céline, a lady who is now in her 90s, and you have something to test the ear. It took about a week to make this transcription, against the usual hour or so.
As impressive as it gets... Viktor Vincent 'Mentaliste' works out the PIN code of the credit card of a hapless Parisian florist. This is from an occasional half hour series early Saturday evenings, on France Télévisions. It's a very good example of two types of listening difficulty - speed and clarity. In fact, if someone speaks clearly, speed is not a real difficulty. I found the speech of the florist at the end much harder to pick up. Oh... and if you can pick up the name of the flowers at the end... let me know
I regularly joke about France Télévision's attempt to produce a sitcom series, Fais pas çi. They announce it's return every so often, put a few episodes on, then take it off again. It's not bad... but it's not very good, either. Don't take my word for it, judge for yourself. It's a hard listening exercise this one
We do not neglect culture on this site, and here is the reason why France is the cultural centre of all the arts, including that of music, where French composers have never equalled those of Germany or Italy. But one can speak beautifully about music in French Laurence Piquet introduced Un soir ... Franz Liszt, and we hear the voice of the French musicologist Alain Duault, who demonstrates what I just said about talking about music, and then a drop-dead gorgeous lady pianist who plays the Sonata in B-flat minor while talking about it ... no easy feat. Linguistically, her voice is fascinating. Very modern, very trendy. Not at all easy to follow, given the competition of the Steinway grand. It's a level-3.
Here, mirrored across from sonsenfrancais, is the amazing Pierre Desproges. It is worth reading his texts carefully. Wonderful language, wonderfully offensive
In the anglo-saxon world we have shops that we used to call pawnbrokers, and which now bear flashy signs that say 'Cash Generator'. In Paris, they have le Crédit Municipal, known as Le Mont-de-Piété, and yes, it's a nationalised money-lender. I am going to lay aside the temptation to discuss whether that's a good thing or not.. it made for an interesting documentary. Also a rather difficult listening exercise, since le Crédit Municipal is a rather noisy place.
We end December with an extract from a Des Racines et des Ailes on Paris, in which we met Victor and Melina who every day live in the 1950's. I loved Victor .. this strange micture of gentleman anglais, and Parisian pimp. A nice little piece, not always easy to follow
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