A few days into the Paris Olympic Games and Chinese netizens are still not over the opening ceremony. Some are calling it an utter disaster, others are marveling over the grandiosity of the first outdoor opening ceremony. Is it a display of chillness (sōngchí găn, 松弛感)? Or is it, simply, “French”?

One viewer under the name Effy commented: “The entire ceremony is free and chill. It’s saying no matter what other countries think, this is the French state of mind!”

The free-spirited nature of this ceremony of many firsts resonated with many viewers. This year’s Olympic opening ceremony was the first one held outdoors without a main stadium and also the first on water, with delegates riding down the Seine river on boats.

The entire experience took viewers on a whirlwind tour of Paris. Better yet, this “city walk” was interspersed with performances by icons like Lady Gaga, Celine Dion, with unexpected appearances from Illumination’s Minions, and shameless plugs from French fashion houses like Louis Vuitton and Christian Dior.

A clear through line of the ceremony was French history and culture. From the recreation of Eugène Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People to a masked torch bearer leaping from rooftops in reference to masked figures from The Phantom of the Opera and even the video game Assassin’s Creed, the performance paid tribute to French culture, high and low.

Yet, for many Chinese netizens, the height of this history lesson was what they dubbed “Olympic Breaking Ice” (奥运开幕式燃冬), in reference to the movie 2023 movie The Breaking Ice, which featured a love triangle between three characters. During the ceremony, a trio of dancers, a tribute to New Wave romance Jules et Jim, frolicked through the French National Library, flipping through romance books and eventually suggestively vanishing behind closed doors.

For netizens, the scene constituted open queer representation, with the suggestion of a ménage à trois. Notably, CCTV commentators went silent during this segment, and viewers were quick to comment on this awkwardness, as such content is usually censored in Chinese media. Netizens crowned the ceremony with the superlative of “most provocative” for this moment.

Many netizens also went into the archives to find clips from the 2008 Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremony, noting that the organized lines of synchronized drummers from 2008 stand in stark contrast to the carefree dancers running through the streets of Paris.

As each Olympic opening ceremony is a show of the host country’s cultural pride, many netizens noted that this one is “very French.”

Banner image via Sanlian Weekly.