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Favourite foreign language TV show

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As now spend around 70% of my screen time watching Walter Presents or the foreign language section of Netflix, been thinking about doing such a post for ages. The start of the Spiral/Engrenages thread finally gave me the kick up the arse I needed

Off the top of my head my current faves are:

Germany – Deutschland 83 and 86, Babylon Berlin, The Dark, The Same Sky

Italy – Gomorrah, My Brilliant Friend, Suburra

Holland – Undercover, The Swingers

South America – El Marginal (Argentina) Senor Videla (Mexico)

Lots more I am interested in seeing including Call my Agent and The Bureau (Both France) and the final series of Deutschland trilogy (D89)

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Comments

  1. A big fan of the German stuff, thought The Same Sky was exceptional – better than the two Deutschlands, though I find the scenes involving Klara (the young swimmer) very hard to watch. Can’t wait to see how they resolve it all in the new series.

    Gomorrah is outstanding though I wanted to avoid it being fed up with crime ridden Naples programmes, but it it is horrific and briulliantly done throughout.

    A word though for both Montalbano and Young Montalbano. If you want escapist nonsense then this is it. It is a bit like a Sicilian version of Midsomer Murders with all these impossibly glamorous women living in this small corner of Sicily. The basic premise of the book and the series that good food comes first, even when there is a Mafia shootout nearby, seems very sound.

  2. It makes little difference to me and the wife, we watch everything with subtitles anyway. So Amazon Prime get a lot of rejection from us, as they so often fail to bother adding subbies to anglophone programming.

  4. We rarely watch English language dramas now. The Spanish ones (ministry of time, Mar de plastico, the barrier), Russian (the nose, to the Lake), and korean (the stranger) have all been exceelent. Plus suburra (Italian).

  5. Just finished Babylon Berlin and loved it, although I’m intrigued to know what happened to the train…
    Another vote for Montalbano, it’s not at all hard to watch most of the time. Some nice little “in” jokes too, like as soon as he sits down to eat undisturbed and after a long day’s work, the phone rings; and Fazio’s lists.
    And it’s a great shame that Ingrid has left Montelusa.
    I wish he’d fix his slippy office door, though.

    Anything Scandi is also great (although the more you watch the more you think that must only be about 25 actors in the whole of Scandinavia, the amount they crop up in the various series), and I’ve just started watching The Nordic Murders, although I’m finding it hard to like Julia as a character, as she conducts her extra-marital affair in a seemingly very public way. Mrs B is withering of her…
    And she needs a change of hat. (Julia, not Mrs B.)

    I might try The Same Sky next.

  6. Yep, it’s Montalbano. It’s the same story every week, but the Inspector’s mystifying sex appeal (short, bald and grumpy man attracts a selection of leggy Italian stunners) gives me a large slice of misplaced hope.

    • It’s a treat for connoisseurs of stereotypes. Any casual discussion goes from three to eleven in volume in a millisecond with much flapping about of hands.

      What’s Italian for “That escalated quickly”?

    • I only watch TV at all because Mrs F won’t listen to Stereolab most of my records.

      As I’ve said elsewhere, we started watching Montalbano but half-way through S1 E1, his ladyfriend sat up in bed with her chesticles on display, which met with Mrs F’s disapproval.

      So it’s back to murders in places where the sun doesn’t ever shine.

      • We watched them all earlier this year (April to June, we didn’t seem to have much else to do), rather strangely from latest to first, which got a little disconcerting at times. The inspector himself barely looks any different in the first episode to the last, whilst Mimi seems to have (quite rightly) aged about 15 years.

        @Hamlet Late contender for Post of the Year above, it gives us all hope. A bit like Samit Patel used to give me when I still played cricket.

        @fentonsteve I share your pain. Mrs B is similarly dismissive of anything that features “that filth” (i.e. any nudity beyond that which would be seen in the pool at a public swimming baths). “You can fast forward through this bit…” etc.

      • Mrs Beezer doesn’t mind televised breasts, though I’m not allowed to register any approval.

        However any sight of a naked male arse on the telly and it’s like living with Joan Sims. ‘Oooh. I say! Wahaaaaay!’ Ooh you can see his bum’.

        That’s her by the way. Not me.

  9. I Know Who You Are (Spain) – brilliant for 3/4 if it jumps the shark a bit at the end. Everyone is impossibly well dressed and the HOUSES…

    We recently rewatched the original The Killing (20 eps) and it holds up very well. Also from Denmark Borgen is superb.

    From Iceland Trapped (series 1, not seen 2 yet) also v good.

    Les Revenants (France) very ethereal, enigmatic, Mogwai soundtrack. Haven’t kept up but enjoyed what we saw.

    • Les Revenants – fantastic first season, managed to maintain the atmospheric intrigue wonderfully well; the second was ok, but suffered from having to present a resolution.

      • Agreed. a bit like Lost in that they’d obviously set up a premise and didn’t really know what to do with it.

        Surprised that nobody at the time noticed that Mogwai’s main theme was pinched from Super Furry Animals though.

  11. I love watching foreign tv too, and trying to watch more of Walter.

    I saw both series of My Brilliant Friend during the lockdown, and it is superb, and not as sentimental as I expected.

    Just finished the Same Sky, and that was good too.

    Also the BBC4 usual suspects -The Bridge, Borgen and Spiral.

    And Money Heist is very entertaining, similar to 24 it does verge on the ridiculous.

  12. I used to enjoy the original Swedish Wallander (thought the Branagh take on it was also very good). And really liked Beck, a conventional enough procedural, but with engaging and well-drawn characters, particularly the awesome and sadly missed Gunwald Larsson.

  13. The first series of The Killing remains the gold standard.

    As mentioned above, Money Heist is great. Preposterous, it’s true, but effortlessly stylish and entertaining, and utterly Spanish. Be aware though that although on Netflix as four series, it is actually two each of which is split in half, so you really are in it for the long haul.

    • Thought Money Heist started getting a bit samey after a while, but season one was terrific fun.

      Locked up is another bingeable Spanish series – a more OTT Wentworth or Orange is the New Black

  14. I enjoyed that one where a burnt-out cop goes back to his/her home village for a bit of peace and quiet and gets caught up against his/her in an unsolved serial killer mystery from years ago. What was it called again?

    Enjoyed most of the above, though gave up on Montalbano because it seemed to go on for too long. It was never over bar the shouting.

    Curently enjoying The Minister, Icelandic political drama featuring that massive bloke from Trapped as a holy fool PM who rules on instinct and impulse. Turns out he’s bipolar…what can possibly go wrong?

  15. Quite possibly doesn’t meet the title of the thread because I wouldn’t describe Wales as ‘foreign’ and there’s probably as much English dialogue as there is Welsh, but I really enjoyed the three series of Hinterland on the beeb. Filmed in Aberystwyth and the surrounding countryside apparently, it certainly had the Scandi feel with the big, bleak landscapes and the lead character was the typical messed up cop (lived in a caravan most of the time).

    Available on Netflix now by the looks of it.

  16. Oh loads. Off the too of my head…

    Killings
    Bridges
    Deuchlands
    Borgan
    Spiral of course
    Call my agent
    La Mante
    Le Bureau
    Faudra

    About to star Deadwind.

  18. I like many of the titles listed above, though I don’t think anyone mentioned Salamander.

    One problem I have is remembering the titles. There was also one titled, I think, Safe.

    I can’t stand Montalbano. It’s limp and uninteresting. It’s only virtue is as a travelogue. And even then it’s not great.

      • Yes, half the time they’re speaking English. It was just good to hear people converse in Welsh (with English subtitles); I think it’s a beautiful thing.

        And I’m having a little pop at the domnant ubiquity of English in the United Kingdom, whereupon the phrase “a foreign language” is automatically taken to mean a language other than English, without any consideration for the others within these islands.

        Oh, and you ought to persevere – the first series gets quite nasty and tense towards the end, and the second series is a great exercise in portraying the banality of evil.

  20. Crikey, this is going to be a memory test. Not only trying to remember what I watched, but also remembering what they were called. I’ll add my voice to Spiral, Le Bureau, The Killing and the Deutschland series to start with.

    Others…

    Braquo – slightly OTT French cop show where everybody seems to be a villain to some extent, including all the cops

    Kingdom – THE best zombie serial set during Korea’s Joseon period I’ve ever seen!

    Maltese – Italian cop v the mafia in Sicily

    Before We Die – Swedish cop show, exciting, despite being a bit silly in places

    Marianne – Excellent French horror – only The Haunting of Hill House is a scarier horror series

    To The Lake – Russian survival series after a deadly pandemic strikes

  23. Another thumbs up here for Spiral. And Inspector Montalbano. I like his house. I aspire to one similar. How idyllic are these places really given he must have solved over 3 dozen murders since he moved in.

    From the days when I sat cross legged in front of a 3 channel telly;

    The Aeronauts. Two French Mirage fighter pilots involved in something or other.
    Belle and Sebastian. A boy and a massive dog called Belle on an Alp. ‘Bellllle! Bellllllle! Etc’
    White Horses. Some horses that were white but got nicked and painted brown. For the lasses, really.

  24. An amusing thing happens here in NZ when the news shows a Vox pop from people in, say, Sunderland about Brexit. The person is speaking English and subtitles appear because TVNZ reckon the average kiwi can’t tune their ears to the accent.

  29. Something called Nox which is French has been recommended to me by my better half. It’s on HBO Nordic here. Then there’s The Miracle, an Italian series I have spoken highly of here before. Also on the list: Fångade or Entrapped which is Icelandic and Karpi which is Finnish, called Deadwind in English. One more is Sorjen, also Finnish, aka Bordertown.

      • Are you enjoying it @twang ? Some of the writing, particularly in the first few series is superb. “Do you have any medical conditions?” “well, I’ve been shot” or the time he reminds Charlie, who is about to take his daughter out on a date, that the armed forces all work for him!

        And it was funny watching Badlands again, after having watched the West Wing, to find that he had that funny way of putting his jacket on back then.

  33. Some great suggestions above. However, I’m surprised that no-one (unless I missed it) has mentioned Heimat, which is a serious contender for the best TV series ever, in any language.

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