The Best TV Shows on ARTE

A sensual approach to culinary art "on the ground", meeting farmers, winegrowers, restaurateurs and cooks, where gastronomy and the art of living have their roots.

Durch die Nacht mit … is a German documentary film television series produced by ZDF for Franco-German television channel ARTE. Locations are mainly in France or Germany. The title of the French version is Au cœur de la nuit. Two Celebrities spend an filmed evening together. One of them is the host who sets the location and the program. There is no moderator.

In this eight-part documentary series, Prigent chronicles the final 36 hours prior to crucial seasonal runway shows featuring creations by some of the fashion world's leading designers: Chanel, Marc Jacobs, Jean Paul Gaultier, Lanvin... In SIGNE CHANEL (2005) and MARC JACOBS & LOUIS VUITTON (2007), documentarian Loic Prigent unveiled rare and refreshing glimpses behind the doors of some of the world's leading fashion houses. THE DAY BEFORE captures 8 differents fashion houses 36 hours before a show. The backstage, the ateliers, the designer in studio, the fittings, the stress and the dramas occuring in this specific period of time. Each episode is totally different but tells the same story: how to create in a state of emergency? This is a never seen before full access story.

Two friends, one former top chef just out of prison and one top sommelier with an alcohol problem, struggle to get their dream restaurant off the ground.

Berlin, 1888. After penniless Ida’s life is saved at the Charité Hospital she must work off the treatment costs. While she becomes acquainted with the most brilliant physicians of this era at the world-famous hospital, the self-determined young woman discovers her passion for medicine.

A look back at the social movements, revolts and youth subcultures from the post-war period to the present day: after the World War II, the left-bank of Paris became a mecca for jazz and alternative living, youth culture was born with trailblazing American movies, and rock became the soundtrack to a generation that wanted to change everything.

Dramatic events unfold in Croatia and Ukraine. The first girl drowned, the second one died from a drug overdose. The main suspect in these deaths, however, soon turns out to be innocent - and dead too. While detective Vladimir and reporter Stribor struggle to solve these murders in Croatia, the niece of Olga, an Ukrainian philanthropist, goes missing in Kyiv.

This German format is not a series properly speaking, as it has no permanent cast or script continuity, but presents each time a 45 minutes documentary, usually in part presented as a docudrama (not faction, as close to scientific knowledge as possible, but visually attractive), elaborating a specific historical theme, widely varied, often exotic in the sense of a far time (as far back as prehistoric times) and/or place (around the globe), although some episodes fit together well, chronologically or thematically, but always fit to be watched separately. Usually authentic locations are used, as well as scenes from and/or interviews about the scientific research it is based upon.

A travelogue that explores the landscapes, people and histories of North and South America.

India's biodiverse landscapes range from vast deserts and dense forests to towering mountains, each contributing to the country's rich tapestry of life. The Himalayas, standing tall in the north, shelter rare and iconic species such as the elusive snow leopards and Himalayan brown bears. Among the dense canopies of the Western Ghats in the south, endangered lion-tailed macaques scour the trees for jackfruit. And lying in the heart of southern India, one of its largest protected woodlands harbours Indian elephants and Bengal tigers. Then finally transitioning to the west, the Thar Desert unfolds, challenging life to adapt to extreme arid conditions. Here, blackbuck antelope and Asiatic lions navigate the vast, sandy expanses in search of food. A tapestry of ecosystems, all within one country.

Words, rituals, objects, references... Karambolage offers an amused comparative anthropology of the locals on both sides of the Rhine.