French: your favourite TV shows

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French: your favourite TV shows

Postby Bluepaint » Fri Oct 27, 2017 12:10 pm

List your favourite French tv shows here. You can also talk about why you liked them, how much you could understand, how you accessed it (NO PIRATING TALK, if you accessed it illegally feel completely free to not mention access/obtainment whatsoever in the slightest at all).

I can't really think of any which is why I started this thread.

I'll start more threads for other media types.
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Re: French: your favourite TV shows

Postby DaveBee » Fri Oct 27, 2017 1:04 pm

1. There's a twenty minute canadian police drama called District 31 that I got completely hooked on for a while, DESPITE understanding very little of the dialog.

2. Louis la brocante, this is a bit of french Lovejoy. Nice people, nice houses, nice countryside and a Citroen H Van! Film length episodes.

3. I've just started watching a sitcom called "Les filles d'à côte". I think this is an official YouTube channel (Génération Sitcoms) of a french TV production company, trying to squeeze some more cash out of their old TV shows.

4. I've also watched a lot of documentaries, mostly from Arte.tv. For some reason I seem to find the speech in documentaries (and radio) easier to understand.
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Re: French: your favourite TV shows

Postby rdearman » Fri Oct 27, 2017 3:21 pm

  • Hero Corp (Bought Disk)
  • Braquo (On Netflix)
  • Engrenages (Was on BBC, now on Netflix)
  • Le Bureau des Légendes (On Amazon Prime)
  • Marseille (Netflix)
  • Mafiosa (This was on Channel 4 in UK at one point)
  • A Very Secret Service (Netflix)
  • Valérian and Laureline (You can find them on YouTube, but difficult. I lucked out and had a French Friend who recorded them for me from French TV)
  • Pékin Express (All seasons except the current one is published on YouTube)

Those are the ones which sprang to mind, although with 2 super challenges behind me I've watched a lot more than those, but they are the best ones I've seen.
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Re: French: your favourite TV shows

Postby MorkTheFiddle » Fri Oct 27, 2017 7:02 pm

Un Village Français (several disks, purchased). Grim life under enemy occupation during World War 2. Could have been called 50 shades of grey in reference to the various shades and mix of courage and collaboration in both villagers and occupiers. Uneven, with the first 2 and the last season the best. First rate acting and direction, especially for the seasons mentioned. I confess to getting quite emotionally involved with some of the characters, both pro and against. I also confess to relying on the English subs.

Maigret (several disks, purchased). The series starring Bruno Cremer (there are at least two other series, one in French, one in English) is what I watched. Cremer's slow and deliberate Maigret is oh, so patient tracking down the criminal. The Maigret of this series is not quite what I imagined the Maigret of Simenon's novels to be, but I found him most satisfactory. If you have little ones, you'll probably want to screen them by yourself. Most of them are as tame as a house-bred sloth, but a couple are not. Some think the pace is a tad slothful, too, but I enjoyed the slow development of plot and character. Again, I relied on the subs. I tried the French, but it was impenetrable.

The website SensCritique has listed its idea of the top 100 French TV series over the years. Though I do not necessarily agree with their choices, I think it makes for an interesting and useful list. I am not going to repeat their list, but their top three shows are Engrenages, Mafiosa and Un village français. At the bottom of their list are a few more "best" lists.

Edited 1 time to add SensCritique reference.
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Re: French: your favourite TV shows

Postby nooj » Sun May 27, 2018 7:45 pm

I recently watched the first season of Zone Blanche (a Belgian-French production) and it was quite good. It is a police-horror kind of mix.
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Re: French: your favourite TV shows

Postby Kraut » Sun May 27, 2018 9:22 pm

"E=M6" is a weekly science-magazine broadcast on Sunday. Probably not meant to be accessed outside of France, but you can receive it unscrambled from less popular satellites at Astra 9 degrees east and as multistream at 5 degrees west in Europe.
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Re: French: your favourite TV shows

Postby Carmody » Mon May 28, 2018 12:47 am

Many thanks for starting this thread.

I am in particular looking for popular French TV shows that are not detective or mystery shows and where I do not need to set up a VPN or proxy or whatever that is.

So I am looking for easy going, family fun sort of programming where I can focus on the words and not the tension and violence. I often watch documentaries, animal and wildlife shows, and stuff on ARTE.

But that is just me...thanks.
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Re: French: your favourite TV shows

Postby Lawyer&Mom » Mon May 28, 2018 4:00 am

Carmody wrote:Many thanks for starting this thread.

I am in particular looking for popular French TV shows that are not detective or mystery shows and where I do not need to set up a VPN or proxy or whatever that is.

So I am looking for easy going, family fun sort of programming where I can focus on the words and not the tension and violence. I often watch documentaries, animal and wildlife shows, and stuff on ARTE.

But that is just me...thanks.
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Generation Sitcoms. Free and legal on YouTube. Light and fluffy. Easy breezy French.
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Re: French: your favourite TV shows

Postby jeffers » Mon May 28, 2018 12:16 pm

Lawyer&Mom wrote:
Carmody wrote:Many thanks for starting this thread.

I am in particular looking for popular French TV shows that are not detective or mystery shows and where I do not need to set up a VPN or proxy or whatever that is.

So I am looking for easy going, family fun sort of programming where I can focus on the words and not the tension and violence. I often watch documentaries, animal and wildlife shows, and stuff on ARTE.

But that is just me...thanks.
:D


Generation Sitcoms. Free and legal on YouTube. Light and fluffy. Easy breezy French.


Génération Sitcoms looks awesomely cheesy! Brilliant!

If you have Netflix, A Very Secret Service (Au service de la France) is a fairly light, but very dry, modern comedy set in the French secret service in the 60s.
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Re: French: your favourite TV shows

Postby jeffers » Mon May 28, 2018 1:05 pm

My own list comes mainly out of shows I've managed to see on TV5 Monde (which I get free with Sky TV in the UK). Generally they have two episodes per week of a series or two, which are generally showing about a year or so after they were on TV in France. One thing they do with current series is they reshow the previous season just before they show the latest season, which is helpful for getting caught up.

So here's my list, with a few comments:
Caïn a cop series set in Marseille, from France 2. Frédéric Cain is a cynical homicide cop in a wheelchair.
Cherif a cop series set in Lyon, also from France 2. Cherif is an Arab homicide cop who loves old TV series, and often uses tricks from them to solve cases.
Candice Renoir another cop series from France 2 set in Marseille. Candice is a divorced single mother trying to make a new start in Marseille.
Boulevard du Palais a cop series set in Paris, which I think has ended recently. I have the only DVD box sets available, which covers about the first half of the whole series. I don't get the impression that they will be releasing any more DVDs because the series was struggling to get a younger audience with the competition of more brutal policiers. One good thing is that each episode is about 1.5 hours and is generally self-contained.
Les petits meurtres d'Agatha Christie is probably my favourite TV series these days. I've watched them on TV5 Monde, and I am tempted to buy the DVDs, but they are comparatively expensive. The stories are both engaging and amusing, and strikes a perfect balance in my opinion.
Meurtres à... yet another cop show. Each episode is completely separate from the others, taking place in entirely different places. It invariably involves a visiting or new cop having to work with a local cop to solve a case, which is invariably linked to local folklore or customs. One thing I really like about the series is that it gives some interesting regional pictures of France.
Marseille a political drama on Netflix, set in Marseille. Very good, and a second series came out recently.
Au service de la France (A Very Secret Service) a light but very dry comedy on Netflix. I really enjoyed this and I hope they come out with a second series.
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