Un Point c'est tout

🏰 In 2023, the Château de Versailles is celebrating its 400-year anniversary with a full year of shows and parties on the site. Quite an appropriate hommage to the palace that has seen some of the most (in)famous historical figures, and witnessed some of the key historical moments of modern European history. (Subtitles are available in French and English by clicking on the CC button on the YouTube control bar). Join this week's conversations on https://www.frenchconversationgroup.com

🎬 (fr) Arte's "Versailles - Le palais retrouvé du Roi-Soleil": https://www.arte.tv/fr/videos/080101-000-A/versailles-le-palais-retrouve-du-roi-soleil/

🕶️ Alain Delon played the role of Caesar in one of the film adaptations of Astérix. For a reason. Alain Delon speaks of himself with the third-person pronoun, Alain Delon is the emperor of French cinema, Alain Delon is… Alain Delon. Raised for six decades as a cinema icon alongside Brigitte Bardot or other celebrities like Marlon Brando, James Dean, etc. Delon is still looking for the role that will end his career at the top.

Let's share our opinions on this controversial figure in this week's conversation on https://www.frenchconversationgroup.com

🍇 September is that time of the year when wine makers gather the grapes to turn it into wine. Each year's new millésime heavily relies on the Summer weather. Hot and dry is excellent, too hot and too dry makes it more challenging. To know more about the process and how important it is in French culture, watch this episode and join us in this week's conversations on https://www.frenchconversationgroup.com

🎭 Needless to introduce the widely famous Avignon bridge on which generations of people have danced in circular motion. But Avignon is much more than that. Taking advantage of its geographical position on the river Rhône, it was over the centuries a prosperous commercial city, and a papal center in France. And nowadays, located on the same train line between Paris, Lyon and Marseille, it also hosts the biggest theater festival in the world. Join this week's conversations on https://www.frenchconversationgroup.com

🎼 About a century ago, composer Maurice Ravel wrote his "Boléro", the most performed piece of music to this day. Yet, despite that success, Ravel remains a mysterious artist. He was secretive and introvert, letting his music speak for himself. Fortunately, his music has a lot to say! Let's bring it into our conversations this week on https://www.frenchconversationgroup.com

🧀 What is there to say about cheese, other than the fact that it is delicious and that it makes you smile on pictures? Well, a lot obviously. Where does it come from? What is a good cheese? To that question, the medieval book "Le Ménagier de Paris" answers: "Neither Argos, nor Helena, nor Maria Magdalena, but Lazarus and Martin, with the heaviness of a pontiff". Let's figure out together what that means! Join this week's conversations on https://www.frenchconversationgroup.com

👑 Cruel, legendary, violent, powerful, intelligent. So many adjectives that could be attributed to this mythical figure. Clovis was real for sure, but we actually don't know much about him due to a great lack of written sources from the late 5th century AD. Anything can be said about him, especially if it helps to found the history of the French monarchy on heroic foundations. One thing is certain, though, he is the pivotal figure between Roman Gaul and medieval France.

Join this week's conversations on https://www.frenchconversationgroup.com

🚀 Fifty years of working, growing and improving. Europe's Ariane space launch program is about to send its all-new Ariane 6 vehicles, the next evolution of its flagship starship, into space. In constant evolution, this new rocket is destined to open the doors to a new technological future, or simply stay up to date with the multiple ever-growing space programs around the world.

Let's talk this week about why and what it means to compete for some space in space, on https://www.frenchconversationgroup.com

👨‍🎨 High among the great masters of French painting, there is Eugène Delacroix. Born in Paris in 1798, he is one of the leaders of Romanticism. But that's not all, following a life-changing trip to Morocco at the age of 34, Delacroix also became one of the important figures of Orientalism, that 19th-century artistic movement fascinated by (what Europeans saw as) Eastern cultures. Join this week's conversations on https://www.frenchconversationgroup.com

🧐 France is probably the country in the world that hosts the most philosophers per square meter. And for the best. There are so many questions with no right or wrong answer that need to be asked. One of them is whether advice should be given to people or whether they should be free to make their own mistakes. With the help of Aristotle, Akhlaghi and Athos from The Three Musketeers, we're going to try and give it a shot for ourselves this week.

Join the conversations on https://www.frenchconversationgroup.com