Joe Hildebrand: Why French drama Lupin is the best show on TV

Foreign language TV shows have been the domain of urbane inner-city types and furtive adolescent boys. Not now, says Joe Hildebrand.

For pretty much as long as they have existed, foreign language films and TV shows have been the domain of urbane inner-city types fond of wearing berets and furtive adolescent boys hoping to catch a late night boob on SBS.

But all that has changed with the advent of Lupin, a French action drama that somehow slipped unnoticed into loungerooms across the world and then spread faster than the Delta variant on rollerblades.

That seems to be the way with streaming shows these days. One minute they’re nowhere, the next they’re everywhere. Now Lupin is one of the biggest smash hits in Netflix history and the first French victory since the Battle of the Somme.

Why? Well, because it’s freaking awesome. It has cops and robbers, fistfights and car chases, dumb tough guys and smart pretty girls and a few anagrams thrown in for good measure.

It really is the show that has everything.

Omar Sy in Lupin.

Needless to say this is in stark contrast to most French cinema, which is pretentious, ponderous and – most outrageously of all – actually considered a form of art.

This is why until now it has remained solely in the purview of skivvy-wearing elites trying to sound smart at dinner parties or to get into the pants of some emo chick.

By contrast, Lupin proves that if you make a TV show that isn’t cripplingly wanky and dull a lot of people will watch it. In fact it was so good I didn’t even realise it was French at first. I just thought the lead character mumbled a lot and wore nice jackets.

Indeed, I am convinced that all the actors move their mouths as little as possible so that people can watch it with English overdubs and barely notice.

I’m not sure Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ would be so seamless, but then again it doesn’t have that many car chases in it.

Joe Hildebrand is on 2GB Nights with John Stanley on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 8pm