Having exhausted charming locations for a series in the UK this one is basically set in Wiltshire, Hampshire, or Gloucestershire with posh people and antiques and fine food and wine (no opera, though) mooching about in an old fashioned mystery, like Lord Peter Wimsey, with garlic mayonnaise.
There is nothing to suggest it is in France except when they use their character names: they talk in English idioms, talk with English theatrical RP accents, and the entire style is steeped in bourgeois ( ooh, a French word) mannerisms.
The alternative of speaking with a bogus French accent would have been absurd but even so, it is not French in any way.
Sure the locations are a big features along with the cafes and the food to give us that sense of France, but it might be a just charabanc of English tourists on an excursion.
In a wider sense this series sums up the common English view of France, cliched, shallow and without any effort to learn the language.
There is nothing to suggest it is in France except when they use their character names: they talk in English idioms, talk with English theatrical RP accents, and the entire style is steeped in bourgeois ( ooh, a French word) mannerisms.
The alternative of speaking with a bogus French accent would have been absurd but even so, it is not French in any way.
Sure the locations are a big features along with the cafes and the food to give us that sense of France, but it might be a just charabanc of English tourists on an excursion.
In a wider sense this series sums up the common English view of France, cliched, shallow and without any effort to learn the language.