One good thing about........

[Quillan]

loosing UK TV when it happens is that I won't have sit through these bloody adverts from charities showing distressed children and animals which puts me right of my afternoon tea. It also puts me off giving them money as well because these TV campaigns must be costing a fortune having been on for months now.

[Chancer]

Well I lost it 5 years ago so clearly I have been benefitting without knowing!

The thing about annoyances is that you just find another, at first I was quite happy with French TV apart from the things I missed, cant even recall what they were but as there was nothing even comparable then I couldnt say its not as good as UK tv, I miss it etc.

Now I have found plenty of things to really irritate me about French TV apart from it being utter rubbish, the constant "euuhhs" where people cannot string two words together like their own name for instance, OK the public being interviewed may be nervous.

Next on the list is that every film that has been dubbed into French has to have all the female characters sounding like they are in constant fear of their lives, the sort of voice that you hear in a teen slash horror movie, even the bird in Kill Bill sounded like that, perhaps they use the same woman for all the dubbing.

Which brings me nicely to les voixs mielleuses which are used by 100% of the women on French adverts, no-body speaks like that in real life, the next woman that makes the mistake of thinking its sexy and using it on me (I should be so lucky!) will get a punch in the chops, the same voice is used by all the characters of feulletons except that they always speak in whispered tones.

I watch very little TV now as a result and have to mute the sound whenever the adverts come around.

When I return to the UK its a Jeremy Kyle fest for me [:-))]

[Rabbie]

I manage to avoid all UK adverts by never watching a commercial channel directly but record it on my Sky plus box so  I can fast forward over the ads.

[krusty]

Over here in CY we have already lost some uk tv.

But we are using the Internet (filmon) to get it back ....gluttons for punishment or what.

[NormanH]

I totally agree with you Chancer about the dubbed voices, yet I have some quite "sophisticated" French friends who cannot understand what I am moaning about. A simple example in a recent film was Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris where the red-necked Republican  parents  are moaning about France.

This just doesn't come over in the 'one-size-fits-all' French voices. It is quite incongruous to hear a French voice say those things.

At the same time I rather like the serious discussions on French TV, and of course the films (not the soaps)[:-))]

[woolybanana]

We know you are a soap man, Norman. And you will be happy to know that one old favourite is coming back.

I have been after a return  of Chateauvallon!

[Ivor Nidea]

I see the Salvation Army are now advertising. Just give £19...what! Nineteen blooming quid for what? The advert includes scenes of Salvation Army bods talking to an elderly lady who apparently lives alone. I bet there is a brass band in the background playing "Jesus wants me for a sunbeam".

Living alone (aaahh), I can just imagine them knocking on my door and all barging in, or inviting me down to some draughty hall to sit alongside hundreds of lonely people smelling of p..... no thanks, I think I will leave it at that.

[Alan Zoff]

It's a difficult one, this.

I once plucked up the courage to ask an old dear who had lived alone for many years on a meagre income if she would like to spend Christmas Day with our family. I thought she would leap at the chance, but she was much too smart.

Firstly, she prefers her own company and her own regime. Secondly, she has to spend the other 364 days on her own so the last thing she wants is to discover that there is an alternative, fantastic life that she probably won't live long enough to experience again, even if asked.

No, thank you, she will stick with what works. Busy bodies can meddle somewhere else.

Of course, there are far more vulnerable souls who do not have her independent spirit for whom Sally Army, etc no doubt do a great deal of good.

[idun]

Frankly I was glad when we got french tv. Our first set in France was a very very old tv that had been left in the awful appt we rented and worked intermitantly with a wire coat hanger. And then the next tv we bought was a black and white one, which worked a little better with the coat hanger. TV used to finish fairly early too, going to the 'dot'. 

I liked french tv being on. I didn't have to answer anyone, all those babbling words would be in the air, and I'd start picking up the odd one and gradually making sense of my new world. And the pictures often helped.

I never minded the same voices on the dubbing. And there are still rubbishy programs that I prefer dubbed into french that I just cannot watch in VO.

We always had terrible reception, from the metal coathanger and then in the house with the two specific ariels and things in place to enhance the signals.

It was nice when we got the alternative of UK tv and after 15 odd years, a clear picture, it was a miracle. We did try and get french satellite, but where our house was, was just at the wrong angle and there was actually a mountain stopping us getting french satellite. So much for it being in the sky.

 

I watch TV5 monde regularly. I watch french news most nights. I would miss french tv if I couldn't get it now.