France With A French Accent (1960s)

[Music] that song what is that song it reminds me of an old New England sea chantey one my grandfather used to sing you are hot it is a song of the sea but it was born here in fast it tells about fishermen sailing away to distant shores whenever the wind blows strong from the east this is all flare it was once a nest of pirates and privateers who shared their booty with the King of France and this Coast is still rich in saints and legends King Arthur and his Knights came searching here for the Holy Grail you know a sailor's work like a housewives is never done but once the waiting for time and tide is over the priest will bless our boats for the long voyage to the codfish banks of Newfoundland [Music] we who stay behind the women young folks and the old ones we keep our small farms green we never throw anything away we refuse to part with old friends we'd rather mend an old tool and give it a new life and toss it on the scrap heap in our country we are used to living in several centuries at the same time you a meal is best planned in the marketplace the French philosopher of cooking Lea sabaha said that no woman should be allowed to marry before she has learned to prepare a perfect soup oh I think a sausage [Music] I must remember to keep out a little something for flowers the eye as well as the palate must be pleased the French flag itself is a bouquet blue for the cornflower white for the Daisy thread for the puppy the garden of us is what our poets called the valley of the revoir fragrant with sunburst greengage plums and the pears of which Robley exclaimed surely there will be none more luscious in paradise villandry the intricate formality of renaissance shrubs clipped to the musical measures of harmoo [Music] the hands of peasant Masons raised the slender towers of Azalea Lido Leonardo da Vinci himself may have been consulted on the design but there was no architect and it was a woman Philippe le by II who directed the construction of the castle from day to day at Brewer on a bleak winter night near Christmas in 1588 King alleys guards murdered the Duke de gi's who had been plotting to seize the throne while two monks sprayed nearby King alley kicked the dead Duke and muttered he looks even bigger dead he needed alive the King's mother Kathleen de Medici had taken part in the plot against her own son what Kathleen was a very bitter woman her husband had given away this jewel of Chenonceau to her rival the under Poitier but as soon as her husband dad she drove the an out and held sumptuous entertainments here the ladies of the court playing mermaid [Music] the new Divino the broken bridge of my childhood crosses straight into the 14th century and the palace of the popes [Music] the Roman legions came and conquered the goals and built the ponte gap with stones weighing up to six tons each the upper level was an aqueduct carrying filtered water from the mountains the two lower tiers were roads for foot soldiers and horse-drawn carriages along this road 100,000 Roman soldiers fell in battle Julius Caesar celebrated his victory by building an arch of triumph 2,000 years before Napoleon was to build his in Paris [Music] [Applause] [Music] here at NEMA gladiators and Christian martyrs fought wild beasts for the glory of the Caesars and the amusement of a mob of 20,000 the men died and the monuments the descendants still play ball boasting that they inherited the game from the ancient Phoenicians who founded the nearby harbor of Malfi [Applause] [Music] [Music] here in Provence a man's house is not just his castle it is his photos this other fortress the monastery of Massa Michel has stood safe from capture 4,000 years protected by tides that run faster than galloping horses where sinners once bought Pardons and indulgences visitors now buy souvenirs and seafood abroad friends from America talk about old houses a museum piece let us say built in 1850 the house I was born in as a cornerstone laid in 1348 and from my window I look across the Seine at notre-dame de Paris the Cathedral of Our Lady of Paris started by the son of a poor woodcutter [Music] rummaging through these stores by not Rodham I often saw Papa Hemingway in his young and beardless days and James Joyce the writers the dreamers the eternally curious have always come here looking for themselves looking for old art and new artists not all the masterpieces are in museums all of us is a giant studio in which every artist wherever he may come from and wherever he may be going can breathe freely mama where Toulouse Lautrec in Valene where van Gogh and Picasso aroused and argued [Music] more map the mouth of matches which pilgrims climbed on their hands and knees the pilgrims are still here and the painters are still arguing tradition or abstraction and every passerby is a critic 40 million Frenchmen can't be wrong because each of us has a different opinion about everything the fragile geometry of a flower in a plowed meadow feathers fanning out for flight these things the hands of the craftsmen never forget when well began his career decorating China in a factory and gyeongbok started as a house painter [Music] [Music] [Music] a chef in force can be the peer of a prime minister next to eating a good meal the greatest pleasure is talking about it [Music] remember what they say in burgundy lace buy soup with a robust one and almost health will be every when I die let me live forever near a barrel full of wine when I die let me live forever near a barrel full of life full of wine yes yes yes full of wine no no no dear a barrel full of wine 32 acres of the very choicest vineyards in towns are owned and cultivated by the crisp Easter bone [Music] this paradox of a modern hospital in medieval surroundings is entirely supported by the sale of wine [Music] neither the rules Robin unsub's have changed in five centuries a meal without wine say the nones is like a day without sunshine he has never been a shortage of either on the French Riviera port of call for all birds of passage enroute to the sweet life [Music] is it any wonder that the great and the glamorous have always made this their place in the Sun all day Mac these Somerset Maugham Winston Churchill Brigitte Bardot [Music] [Music] run surf to snow in one short hour will the more blunt towering three miles into the sky [Music] these icy turrets and arabesques near Simoni used to be the domain of the mountain climbers exclusively [Music] some of us prefer after sitting down for us there are cable cars and telephonic and hidden helicopters to carry us to the Aiguille du Midi and the glaciers nevertheless the lure of clambering up a sheer rock wall which any sensible goat would avoid continues to attract alpinists from the five continents the novices get their training here in the techniques of rope and beaten while some men beat their endurance against the mountain others pit themselves against the machine and the clock 80 of the world's top racing drivers are warming up for the toughest of contests the 24 hour long race at Lu Mong [Music] I doubt if anything in later life can equal the wander glory of this first ride old earth is becoming a nation of the young we've been producing bumper crops of babies since the end of the war [Music] to surpass IQ same affari see you later Jill what only fool like ok that the California no shallow a party where the Eiffel Tower is your elevator the riverboats your private yachts the banks of the Seine your backyard is yeah it's all wrong don't go gay at all buddy [Music] Hillenburg after dosha my safari yes yeah to do the taxi or the homeless that shouldn't more you are Perry where the art of living leaves room for the art of loafing [Music] [Music] he loved God or less used to some say some word I say yes Sakhi opened up I said Nikki Slava me to later the last minute or less [Music] sukhiya notice a Pascal is a non vedo table to be a love-in Jetta Lou Aparri where every cafe is your power well the whole city is your mansion and the whole world is your honor [Music] and okay we met on a party where the grisly nightlife of the gay 90's has become all the brighter for the electric lights and the electric ladies of cafe and cabaret [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music]