May 2010

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We start May with a nice little documentary from Toute l'histoire on the early cinema

I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw that La chaîne parlémentaire was proposing to televise a British election debate of one and a half hours. Did they want to lose viewers? But I found the introduction by their economics commentator Jean-Louis Gombeaud amusing. The French can never resist taking a gentle dig at the hereditary enemy, and Gombeaud pointed out with pedantry and pleasure that Britain has been the worst affected of all the European countries by the financial crisis, and that her public debt puts her in the same league as Greece ! I refrain from comment...

Here's one of TF1 News' standard and professionally produced enquiries - this time on cyber-criminality. Not sure I believe it totally - companies are vulnerable because they are careless, more than because  hackers are clever. But it makes a nice piece.

So often it's the little 'filler' programmes that provide interesting material. Here is an extract from a half hour documentary on Lego, screened by Arte just before the children's programmes Saturday morning. It's a remarkably academic piece destined no doubt for the attention  of the frightfully intelligent young mums who watch Arte.

One of the great weekend institutions on French public television is Le plus grand cabaret du monde of Patrick Sebastian. Jugglers and acrobats don't afford much material for this site, so I was glad to stumble upon this 'mentalist'. A very ordinary act, after all, but enlivened by the fact that Patrick Sebastian buts in at every opportunity

Here's another well-written little enquête from TF1 evening news. Is society willing to go to the expense of taking ADN samples from tramps who die as they lived, anonymously. One would hope so...

Here is a moment from a good documentary on General De Gaulle. No shortage of such films, but this one was based on the amateur footage made by his son Philippe and which is the only record of the family life of le grand Charles. I include it also because the narration is spoken by Jean Rochefort

Christophe Hondelatte, the ghoul of French Television returns to regale us with another particularly gory and unpleasant murder. No wonder he gets such good viewing figures. But it's a well researched piece of entertainment, and the participants offer a range of voices for us to study

Apart from any intrinsic interest there may be in the art of the sculpter Rodin, I chose this piece as an example of very clear French spoken by Laurence Piquet the presenter, by an actor, and by the conservateur of this exhibition. We often have extracts, more or less difficult on this site, but there is a place also for examples of clear, well-spoken French

As usual when I post a comedy clip on sonsenfrancais.org which is particularly comprehensible, I include it here also, with a subtitle file. Here is Fernand Raynaud Y a pas de justice !

France 3 has an occasional series at lunchtime for housewives sitting in front of the telly, and which I nearly always miss. Here is a nice clip from the little documentary on the '60s pop singer Mike Brant

Although the reporters of TF1 News enjoy uncovering industrial scandals that affect the health of workers, it's not so easy when the subject is the biggest uranium company of the world that supplies cheap electricity to France, when the country is an ex-colony, and where the company, frankly, isn't all that scandalous. But decide for yourself...

From our old favourite Comment c'est fait we have five minutes on the manufacture of police whistles. Perhaps it's a male thing, but I always find these little pieces interesting - and even in the easier extracts, as here, there is some new and specialised vocabulary.

Des Racines et des Ailes must be the documentary series most watched by students of French. It is beautifully photographed, often very interesting, and the voice-over rings as clear as a bell. No harm in having a few easy ones, is there ?

We've had a few Level-1 & 2 extracts recently so here's a real Level-3. From a TF1 documentary, the story of Lionel who loses his job, his flat, has to sleep in a railway station, and finally ends up in a seedy hotel. If you're French, you will sympathise. If you are British or American you probably won't. I won't say more than that.

I don't normally use Thierry Guerrier's early evening interview program for the site because the subjects are social or political and therefore of transitory interest. But this story of a young community policewoman shot as she was investigating a road acciedent... my goodness.

France 5 has an occasional series about celebrities called Les derniers jours de... Rarely happy, and this is certainly true of poor Romy Schneider.

For the last entry in May, we return to David Pujadas and the Vingt Heures of France2, where thegovernment - like all governments  - is intent on fiddling round the edges of the educational system. 'Give 'em more sport ... good for the moral fibre!' Yes, but who pays, and who teaches it ? Not surprised the kids like it, though.

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