French Shoes Commercial from the 70s

This a vintage French TV commercial from the 1970s for women’s shoes. The commercial plays on the theme of the women’s rights movement of that time period. If you did deep there’s lots of great basic grammar in this ad including direct object pronouns, usage of the preposition chez and much more.

text and translation

• La femme n’est pas l’égal de l’homme.
  Women are not equal to men.
• Elle cuisine. Moi, j’adore la faire.
  She (the woman) cooks. I love to cook.
• Quand l’homme offre des fleurs, des cadeaux, je trouve ça normal.
  I find it normal when me offer flowers and gifts.
• J’aime bien m’habiller.
  I like to dress well.
• J’aime bien aller chez le coiffeur.
  I like to go to the hair salon.
• J’aime bien être belle.
  I like to be beautiful.
• J’aime bien m’acheter des chaussures.
  I like to buy myself shoes.
• Ça vous choque? T’entends que ça aujourd’hui?
  Does that shock you? That’s all you hear today.
• Moi, ce qui me choque, c’est d’acheter les chausseurs à n’importe quel prix.
  What shocks me is to buy shoes at just any price.
• Cinquante-cinq francs.
  55 francs.
• Cinquante-cinq francs, chez Eram
  55 francs at Eran.

vocabulary and grammar of interest

• j’adore la faire – I love to do it. The -la- is the direct object pronoun meaning it, referring back to faire la cuisine.
• des fleurs – the des here is the plural indefinite article, which can translate to “some”.
• quand l’homme offre – from the verb offrir, to offer.
• J’aime bien m’habiller – I like to dress well. Here’s an entire lesson on infinitives of a reflexive verbs
• J’aime bien + infinitive – Aimer bien faire quelque chose means to like doing something. J’aime bien étudier le français! I like studying French!
• T’entends que – could be written tu n’entends que. This is ne + verb + que which means “only”. Je ne mange que le fromage. I only eat cheese. Here’s an entire lesson on the negation.
• n’importe quel prix – translates to any price. Here’s an entire lesson expressions with n’importe. N’importe quoi! That’s nonsense!
• chez Eram – This is a lesser known usage of chez. You can put in before a company name. Je travaille chez FrenchLearner. I work at FrenchLearner. Here’s a lesson on the preposition chez.

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David Issokson

David Issokson is a lifelong language enthusiast. His head is swimming with words and sounds as he speaks over six languages. Of all the languages he speaks, he's the most passionate about French! David has helped hundreds of students to improve their French in his private online lessons. When procrastinating working on his site, FrenchLearner.com, David enjoys his time skiing and hiking in Teton Valley, Idaho.

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