In the latest installment of Le Jour où tout a basculé, we find two very different uses of the verb passer. The first is a direct cognate of the English verb "to pass," referring to time passing:
Quatre mois ont passé.
Four months have passed.
Caption 30, Le Jour où tout a basculé - Mon père s'oppose à ma passion - Part 6
Play Caption
The second, referring to taking an exam, is a false cognate. You might assume that passer son bac means "to pass one's baccalaureate exam." But that's wrong! Passer in this context actually means "to take":
J'ai passé mon bac.
I took my baccalaureate.
Caption 41, Le Jour où tout a basculé - Mon père s'oppose à ma passion - Part 6
Play Caption
If you want to talk about passing an exam, use the verb réussir (to succeed):
Demain il réussira son examen.
Tomorrow he will pass his exam.
Caption 27, Le saviez-vous? - Conjugaison des verbes du 2ème groupe au futur simple
Play Caption
Passer's other meanings are more predictable. You can use it transitively (i.e., with an object) to to talk about passing something to someone:
Passe le micro.
Pass the mic.
Caption 54, Arles - Le marché d'Arles
Play Caption
Or you can use it intransitively (without an object) to describe someone passing by or passing from one place to another:
Tous les ans, effectivement, nous demandons à Saint-Nicolas de passer.
Every year, in fact, we ask Saint Nicholas to pass by.
Caption 44, Grand Lille TV - Focus: la tradition de Saint-Nicolas
Play Caption
Et maintenant on va passer en cuisine avec le chef.
And now we'll go into the kitchen with the chef.
Caption 33, Parigot - Le bistrot
Play Caption
Just as you can "pass time" (or "spend time") in English, you can passer du temps in French:
Et puis ça permet de passer un bon petit moment ensemble.
And then it allows us to spend a good bit of time together.
Caption 47, Actus Quartier - Fête de quartier Python-Duvernois - Part 2
Play Caption
The expression passer pour means "to pass for," as in "to be taken for" or "seem like":
La maîtrise des synonymes vous permettra donc d'élargir votre vocabulaire, mais aussi, de ne pas passer pour un psychopathe.
Mastering synonyms will therefore allow you to broaden your vocabulary, but also to not be taken for a psychopath.
Captions 23-24, Le saviez-vous? - Les synonymes
Play Caption
As passer is such a versatile verb, it's no surprise that it's used in many, many common expressions. We'll pass along a handful of them to you:
passer à autre chose - to move on to something else
passer à l'acte - to take action
passer à la caisse - to pay/checkout
passer à la télévision - to be on TV
passer à table - to sit down for a meal (also has the figurative meaning "to snitch" or "spill the beans")
passer un coup de fil - to make a phone call
passer de la musique - to put on some music
passer au bloc - to go under the knife/have surgery
passer au peigne fin - to go over with a fine-tooth comb
passer à côté de - to miss/miss out on
laisser passer sa chance - to miss one's chance
You can find even more expressions on this WordReference page.
And to learn about the reflexive form of passer, se passer, check out our lesson Se Passer: To Bypass and Pass By.
We all know that when you're angry about something, it's better to talk about your emotions than to keep them pent up inside. If you ever need to vent in French, there are several constructions you can use to express your anger.
Two of these constructions employ the French word for anger, la colère (related to the English word "choleric," meaning "bad-tempered" or "irritable"). As in English, there's a distinction in French between being angry (être en colère) and getting angry (se mettre en colère, literally, "to put oneself in anger"):
J'étais très en colère contre Harold.
I was very angry at Harold.
Caption 28, Le Jour où tout a basculé - Notre appartement est hanté
Play Caption
Elle devenait nerveuse, elle se mettait en colère.
She became nervous, she got angry.
Caption 3, Le Jour où tout a basculé - Mon père n'est pas mort
Play Caption
Note the preposition contre in the example above. Whereas in English you can be angry "at" or "with" someone, in French you're angry "against" someone.
If you're really angry about something, you can use the construction fou/folle de (which we discussed in a previous lesson):
Elles sont folles de colère, folles de rage, horripilées.
They are wild with anger, raging mad, incensed.
Captions 52-54, Le saviez-vous? - Les synonymes
Play Caption
Besides expressions with colère, the other main way of describing anger in French is with the adjective fâché(e) (angry) or the reflexive verb se fâcher (to get angry):
Tu es fâché contre Léon?
Are you angry with Leon?
Caption 2, Les zooriginaux - Léa jacta est
Play Caption
Ça va, vieux, te fâche pas!
It's OK, old pal, don't get upset!
Caption 22, Il était une fois... L’Espace - 3. La planète verte
Play Caption
Don't confuse the adjective fâché(e) with the adjective fâcheux/fâcheuse, which has a slightly more subdued meaning. It can mean anything along the lines of "annoying," "unfortunate," "regrettable," or "aggravating":
C'est fâcheux qu'il ne puisse pas venir.
It's unfortunate that he can't come.
We hope there was nothing in this lesson that made you angry! Stay tuned for our next lesson and tweet us @yabla or send your topic suggestions to newsletter@yabla.com.
In her latest video, Patricia gives us an overview of French synonyms, or words with the same basic meaning but different nuances and intensities. To demonstrate, she illustrates some examples of synonyms for "happy" and "angry." She repeatedly uses the expression être fou/folle de (to be mad or wild with) to describe the more intense degrees of those emotions:
Elles sont folles de bonheur.
They are mad with happiness.
Caption 40, Le saviez-vous? - Les synonymes
Play Caption
You can use this expression to heighten just about any word describing an emotion:
Ils sont extatiques, fous de joie, béats.
They are ecstatic, overjoyed, blissful.
Captions 37-39, Le saviez-vous? - Les synonymes
Play Caption
Elles sont folles de colère, folles de rage, horripilées.
They are wild with anger, raging mad, incensed.
Captions 52-54, Le saviez-vous? - Les synonymes
Play Caption
Or, you can use it with any other noun or pronoun to describe something or someone you're "crazy about":
Non, je ne suis pas fou. Je suis seulement fou de vous!
No, I am not crazy. I'm only crazy about you!
Caption 6, Charles-Baptiste - Interview
Play Caption
...qui montre la vie trépidante des jeunes,
...that shows the hectic life of young people
fous de voitures dans les années soixante-dix.
who are crazy about cars in the seventies.
Caption 8, L'auteur - Bernard Colin
Play Caption
If you haven't already, check out Patricia's other videos in the Le saviez-vous? series for more of her excellent insights into French language and culture.
Thanks for reading! If you have any questions or comments, please write to us at newsletter@yabla.com or tweet us @yabla.
Spanish
German
Italian
Chinese
English
English 
Deutsch
Español
Français
Italiano
