Skip to main content

French press review 5 December 2014

A cap on French actors' wages, a ban on household fires in the capital, a new, French, James Bond Girl and a Tobin Tax that could be buried by the government are all topics in today's French papers.

Advertising

Left-leaningLibération is pretty sarcastic this morning on its front page.

"Poor Stars" headlines the newspaper. Libération is explaining that the National Cinematography Centre (CNC), a public organisation that subsidises most French movies, will now refuse to give handouts to films in which actors are paid more than 990,000 euros.

This follows a controversy that started two years ago, when some movie professionals started complaining that a few French movie stars were getting too much money.

France's cinema industry is heavily subsidised by the state. That's why we get so many movies, explains the paper. But it also costs a lot and that's why the CNC has decided to put a limit to how much actors are earning. And, even if 990,000 euros is a lot of money, some big names will lose out with the new rule. Just to give you an example, comic Dany Boon earned eight million euros last year.

In Paris a ban on liighting a fire in your fireplace is making some people angry. Le Figaro is even calling it a war and is devoting an entire page to the subject. From 1 January Parisians won't be allowed to set a fire in their hearths.

The reason? The right-wing newspaper explains that in the Paris region fireplaces are causing as much pollution as cars, leading Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo to forbid household fires.

According to the daily, a lot of people are not happy with the decision.

Brice, a chimney sweep, says he is worried for his business. Next year if Parisians still want to start a fire, they'll have to instal a wood stove. A solution that Le Figaro doesn't like very much, because, first, it's expensive, and secondly, it's not very traditional.

The new Bond girl is French, it was announced on Thursday according to French website Slate. Léa Seydoux and Monica Belluci will both star alongside Daniel Craig in the next instalment of the Jams Bond franchise.

That's good news, explains the website, because that means that France ranks third in the Bond girl national origins league table with 12 actresses. It's the fourth time in a row that one of the Bond girls is French.

There might be an explanation to this says Slate. "The 

"Bond girls are not used as props anymore," it explains. "They're now partners and they must be intelligent."

Plus, having a French actress will also help for the promotion of the film in France, which is a big market for the James Bond franchise.

The Tobin Tax could be dropped by the government, explains this morning's L'Humanité.

The Tobin Tax, a currency transaction tax, has been defended many times by French President François Hollande. The idea would be to tax financial transactions between financial institutions at a 0.1 per cent rate.  But the measure, first taken in France, would then be implemented at the European level.

The communist daily explains that's a problem because the French government's proposal is too small compared to the German proposal. Apparently, Michel Sapin is simply tempted to drop the tax. A tax that has been debated in France, and in Europe, for the past 20 years.

Daily newsletterReceive essential international news every morning

Keep up to date with international news by downloading the RFI app

Share :
Page not found

The content you requested does not exist or is not available anymore.