From Denmark to Dunkirk, political drama — and one comedy — on foreign TV
Is it possible to build an entire season of good television drama around Article 49.3 of the French Constitution? Actually, yes. (Just ask Emmanuel Macron)
Fifth in a series of posts about foreign television. Previous posts here, here, here and here.
And see also my 2021 post about the Senegalese-French political drama Wara and 2022 post about the Japanese drama The Journalist.
Political dramas, thrillers, and comedies can be found all over the world. But any discussion of this genre of foreign television has to begin in …
Denmark
UPDATE: SEPTEMBER, 2020: Borgen is now streaming on Netflix, which plans to release a fourth season in 2022.
One day a few years ago, I turned to author and journalist Celia Viggo Wexler and said: “We just watched a one-hour drama about pig farming. In Denmark. And we liked it.”
Granted, the pig farming story wasn’t the best episode of the Danish political drama Borgen, but it gives some indication of just how good this political drama really is. It’s now available for streaming or on DVD from many sources.
Borgen was produced by Danish public broadcaster DR. Over three seasons, it tells the story of the rise, fall and rise again of Birgitte Nyborg (Sidse Babett Knudsen) Denmark’s first female prime minister — presaging real events by just a few years. I won’t say much more because so much already has been said. I know of no other foreign language television series to get so much praise and attention in the United States — all of it deserved. And I know of no other foreign language series to win a George Foster Peabody Award.
Borgen often is called the Danish West Wing. But what was, for me, the most poignant line in the entire series still resonates precisely because it could never be credibly uttered in an American political drama, not even one as idealistic as West Wing. It’s the moment Nyborg turns to her longtime mentor Bent Sejrø (Lars Knutzon) and says: “Remember when we thought we’d solved it all?”
France
Things are a lot more down and dirty in French politics — at least as portrayed in two French television series streaming on Walter Presents (which is now part of the PBS Masterpiece channel on Amazon — a good thing, by the way, since when it was a freestanding service the interface was awful.) [UPDATE: These series have moved around a lot. The first one discussed below, Spin is now streaming on MHz Choice. The second Baron Noir, has moved to Topic.]
Equally awful was the decision to take a perfect French title for a political drama about spin doctors, Les Hommes de l’ombre (The Men in the Shadows) and change it to Spin for English language consumption. Fortunately, that’s all they’ve messed with.
Produced for French public broadcaster France 2, the drama revolves around the battle between good spin doctor Simon Kapita (Bruno Wolkowitch) and his onetime protégé-turned-evil spin doctor Ludovic Desmeuze (Grégory Fitoussi).
The excellent first season, released in 2011, begins with the assassination of the French President. Appalled by the extremism of the right and the fecklessness of the left, Kapita persuades Social Affairs Minister Anne Visage (Nathalie Baye), a right-leaning centrist in the current government, to create a new political movement and run as an independent under the slogan “Ensemble.”
This is, of course, ridiculous. When Emmanuel Macron actually did this a few years later his slogan was “Ensemble, la France!”
The second two seasons are not as good as the first; in fact, they’re eclipsed by another French political drama.
Fortunately no one felt the need to translate the title for this one: Baron Noir. The series is a production of Canal+, the French HBO.
The premise boils down to this: What if Richard J. Daley, the legendary boss of Chicago were French — and running Dunkirk? Philippe Rickwaert (Kad Merad) is fueled by a combustible combination of greed, lust for revenge against a President who betrayed him and some actual ideals. (Rickwaert also is portrayed as irresistible to women, proving, without having to check the IMDb, that the series was written almost entirely by men.)
The series gets much better in the second season, when the focus shifts from local to national politics. The dialogue is fast-paced and while the French is, of course, translated, the political jargon is not. But it’s well worth trying to keep up. This is the season that sent me to Google to look up Article 49.3 of the French Constitution, which happens to be a vital part of the plot. [UPDATE, MARCH 2023: It also happens to be what Marcon just used to pass his bill raising the retirement age. In France, the headlines are ripped from Baron Noir.] This also is the season that taught me the wonderful term used in France for trading pork-barrel projects for votes: a “buyer’s club.” [UPDATE, MARCH 2021: Season 3 has just been made available in the United States, and it’s the best of all! (Where else but France would candidates for leadershiop of their party believe it’s only fair that, before debating, they exchange bibliographies?) All three seasons are now available on a different streaming service, Topic — and right now the first episode of Season 1 is free.]
By the way, Netflix also has a French political drama, Marseilles. But it’s not nearly as good.
Australia
O.K., so I’m cheating a little. I said these posts would be about foreign language television. But between the accents and the slang, I think one could make a case that Australian English qualifies. And even if you can’t, I can’t pass up a chance to praise Dreamland (Or, as it’s called in Australia, Utopia) produced for Australia’s public broadcaster, ABC.
As Celia put it, Dreamland is a cross between The Office and Yes, Minister. But it’s gentler than the former. Whereas The Office made me cringe, Dreamland makes me laugh. (I discovered the series during its second season; according to writer Ahmad Khan, the first season was more cynical.) For one thing, the people who run the fictional government agency at the center of the program, the “Nation Building Authority,” really want to do advance the public good. Their efforts generally are thwarted by the usual suspects, politicians and p.r. people.
The series provides plenty of useful information, such as explaining the real reason people work on building a social media presence, and how consultants are selected.
The biggest problem with Dreamland/Utopia at the moment is finding it. It turns up on some local public television stations from time to time. Netflix used to stream it, but not at the moment. Perhaps their consultants told them to stop running it.
