Short films from places where the language still lives.

8 films

• Food Through History

  Buying Bread Before the French Revolution

  A morning queue outside a Paris bakery, and the vocabulary of scarcity, price, and politeness in the months before everything changed.

  Paris, 1788French6 minIntermediate
• Life Along the French Riviera

  Learning French at a Riviera Marina

  Lucien walks the pontoons at seven in the morning, greeting neighbours and naming everything in sight.

  Cannes, todayFrench8 minBeginner
• Markets Around the World

  A Roman Merchant Negotiates a Sale

  Weights, wine, and the careful courtesies of a port bargain conducted entirely in classical Latin.

  Ostia, 112 ADLatin7 minAdvanced
• Ordinary Lives During Extraordinary Times

  Learning Irish in a Village Pub

  Introductions, weather, music, and the long art of the conversational detour.

  Connemara, 1954Irish9 minBeginner
• Ordinary Lives During Extraordinary Times

  A Resistance Courier Delivers a Secret Message

  Language under pressure: indirect speech, coded phrasing, and the vocabulary of trust.

  Lyon, 1943French11 minAdvanced
• Historic Cities

  Meeting Napoleon

  Formal register, honorifics, and the grammar of addressing power without flattering it.

  Fontainebleau, 1814French12 minAdvanced
• Life in Imperial China

  A Silk Workshop in Suzhou

  Xiu Ying explains thread, dye, and season, and the measure words that hold the craft together.

  Suzhou, 1890Chinese (Mandarin)10 minIntermediate
• Mexico During the Second French Intervention

  The Baker of Puebla

  One bakery, one siege, and the everyday Spanish of rationing, bargaining, and stubborn hope.

  Puebla, 1863Spanish9 minIntermediate