Jump to content

BBC 4 Program on France


kelly58

Recommended Posts

Guest JudgeMental
i enjoyed the first of new series on Sicily the other night..It is a 3 parter, a mixture of culture and wonderful cooking!
Link to comment
Share on other sites

starvin marvin - 2012-01-11 10:50 AM

 

Thanks for the information, I like J Meades. I hope its a proper interesting programme and not like Fry in America but that was on TV, all the better "pictures" are on the Radio.

 

 

It's on BBC4 TV marvin, so if you prefer sound only you'll have to watch it with your eyes shut.

 

 

 

:-D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

malc d - 2012-01-11 12:57 PM

 

starvin marvin - 2012-01-11 10:50 AM

 

Thanks for the information, I like J Meades. I hope its a proper interesting programme and not like Fry in America but that was on TV, all the better "pictures" are on the Radio.

 

 

It's on BBC4 TV marvin, so if you prefer sound only you'll have to watch it with your eyes shut.

 

 

 

:-D

 

Didn't know there was such a thing, whatever next! My wife has often said that I watch most TV with my eyes shut, so no change there then.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

kelly58 - 2012-01-11 10:36 AM

 

I have just seen advertised a new program on BBC4 Wednesday 18th Jan 9pm a 3 part series exploring parts of France ignored by British Tourists by Jonathan Meads may be worth a look.

 

Oddly enough, my wife has just been perusing the Radio Times for next week and commented on this programme. We shall certainly aim to watch it - those of you residing in 'less populated' parts of the UK may not realise that here in the heavily populated South East we currently only have channels 1-4 Analogue, and since we shoose not to pay for SKY or similar will be unable to record it....!!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Keith T - 2012-01-12 5:42 PM

 

kelly58 - 2012-01-11 10:36 AM

 

I have just seen advertised a new program on BBC4 Wednesday 18th Jan 9pm a 3 part series exploring parts of France ignored by British Tourists by Jonathan Meads may be worth a look.

 

Oddly enough, my wife has just been perusing the Radio Times for next week and commented on this programme. We shall certainly aim to watch it - those of you residing in 'less populated' parts of the UK may not realise that here in the heavily populated South East we currently only have channels 1-4 Analogue, and since we shoose not to pay for SKY or similar will be unable to record it....!!

 

 

 

BBC4 is on Freeview - so you don't need Sky.

 

I thought most places down in the south east could get Freeview ?

 

(You can always check the Freeview coverage on their website)

 

8-)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

malc d - 2012-01-12 7:11 PM

 

Keith T - 2012-01-12 5:42 PM

 

kelly58 - 2012-01-11 10:36 AM

 

I have just seen advertised a new program on BBC4 Wednesday 18th Jan 9pm a 3 part series exploring parts of France ignored by British Tourists by Jonathan Meads may be worth a look.

 

Oddly enough, my wife has just been perusing the Radio Times for next week and commented on this programme. We shall certainly aim to watch it - those of you residing in 'less populated' parts of the UK may not realise that here in the heavily populated South East we currently only have channels 1-4 Analogue, and since we shoose not to pay for SKY or similar will be unable to record it....!!

 

 

 

 

BBC4 is on Freeview - so you don't need Sky.

 

I thought most places down in the south east could get Freeview ?

 

(You can always check the Freeview coverage on their website)

 

8-)

 

Ah, yes,some but not all, though they are now in process of changing and all will be able to by June 2012....it just depends where your aerial is lined up to,, and regrettably where we live, the current Freeview is on a low powered transmitter, which we cannot receive, but the digital one for the future is not yet converted!

I check quite regularly, but the transfer date shown is May/June,over the course of 2 weeks!

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Keith T - 2012-01-12 11:02 PM
malc d - 2012-01-12 7:11 PM
Keith T - 2012-01-12 5:42 PM
kelly58 - 2012-01-11 10:36 AMI have just seen advertised a new program on BBC4 Wednesday 18th Jan 9pm a 3 part series exploring parts of France ignored by British Tourists by Jonathan Meads may be worth a look.
Oddly enough, my wife has just been perusing the Radio Times for next week and commented on this programme. We shall certainly aim to watch it - those of you residing in 'less populated' parts of the UK may not realise that here in the heavily populated South East we currently only have channels 1-4 Analogue, and since we shoose not to pay for SKY or similar will be unable to record it....!!
BBC4 is on Freeview - so you don't need Sky.I thought most places down in the south east could get Freeview ?(You can always check the Freeview coverage on their website) 8-)
Ah, yes,some but not all, though they are now in process of changing and all will be able to by June 2012....it just depends where your aerial is lined up to,, and regrettably where we live, the current Freeview is on a low powered transmitter, which we cannot receive, but the digital one for the future is not yet converted!I check quite regularly, but the transfer date shown is May/June,over the course of 2 weeks!

You could always watch it on the computer via bbc i-player

Link to comment
Share on other sites

kelly58 - 2012-01-19 8:14 AM

 

Is it me or was it rubbish not what I expected.

 

Not sure about your "rubbish" critique, but it was a classic Jonathan Meades presentation and pretty much exactly what I anticipated - basically, that's what JM is like. You might want to look at the following

 

http://www.clivejames.com/jonathan-meades

 

I watched the programme simultaneously reading a trashy novel and wondering why I had mentioned on another forum thread that Ford had used a 3.0litre 5-cylinder motor to the Transit Mk 7 when I knew full well it was a 3.2litre. Multi-tasking - nothing to it!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

kelly58 - 2012-01-19 8:14 AM

 

Is it me or was it rubbish not what I expected.

 

 

 

As I had read a write-up in the Radio Times warning that it was typical Jonathon Meades, I wasn't too surprised.

I think the title was a bit misleading.

 

It was more about the French, and a bit of French history, not really about France or the French landscape.

 

 

:-|

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest 1footinthegrave
How embarrassing that I posted a reminder of this program yesterday evening,still I was very lucky I had painted a door just before it started, so after half an hour I went back to watching it dry. :$
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh, you are all suuuch Philistines...

 

The INDEPENDENT summed up the programme perfectly:

 

The boilerplate way of beginning a documentary these days is to read out a bombastic contents list. In the first of his films about France, Jonathan Meades decided it would be more instructive to tell us what we weren't going to get: "No strings of onions, no Dordogne, no boules, no Piaf, no ooh-la-la, no Gallic shrugs, no street markets, no checked tableclothes," he said. And, it seems, only a very tiny snatch of accordion music, briefly aired to acknowledge the unavoidable trope and then swiped away with a needle scratch. Instead, Jonathan Meades on France offered "Fragments of an Arbitrary Encyclopedia", a collage of entries, all beginning with V and proceeding alphabetically from Valise to Vosges, by way of Vaugeois, Verdun and Vexatious Litigants, among other things.

 

Not all that arbitrary, it should be noted, despite the apparently random construction of Meades's essay. Because what eventually emerged was a suggestive tangle of subjects, frequently connected by cross-reference and ultimately producing a coherent (or kind of coherent) essay about French patriotism and its self-deceptions. You got reactionary politics, notes on style, digressions into typography and topography, discursions on the food and architecture of border regions and – all the way through – a resolute and dogged resistance to the standard clichés of the television travelogue. Yes, Meades's opening piece to camera was filmed in front of a lovely stretch of French countryside. But what entirely filled the foreground, stubbornly unlovely, was a wedge of empty tarmac. And yes, you did actually get some red-checked material, in an Alsacien bistro. But, let's be fair, it wasn't on the table.

 

Meades is one of the few really distinctive stylists we have left on television. His prose is aggressively undemotic (where another presenter would say "pig farming", he says "porcine husbandry") and his manner is mischievously indifferent to the terror of not-being-likable that seems to pervade so much presentation these days. He gives the impression of not caring in the slightest whether you think Charles Maurras and Action Française are interesting or whether you share his fascination with the utopian architecture of Claude Ledoux, which he described here as "exhilaratingly sullen". A sudden close-up of his face on those words, expressionless and unsmiling, hinted that whoever was calling the shots in the editing suite thought this wasn't a bad description of Meades either.

 

Some won't be exhilarated, I suppose. They'll think it's "elitist" (because they've got used to television treating them as fools and calling it a kind of courtesy). Or they'll get lost in the complexity of the information that is being offered, which includes no forgiving redundancies or short cuts. I wouldn't blame anyone who does get lost – it's a concentrated bouillon of unfamiliar facts and rapid allusion, and if I had any complaint it would be that a series of six half-hours would have been a little easier to absorb. You really do have to concentrate. But it doesn't half repay it. If for no other reason, I would love it for telling me that the French for window shopping is lèche-vitrine, literally window-licking."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...