Oh … and let’s not forget French’s mustard.
Or Mr. French from Family Affair.
The town of Nice.
The phrase l’esprit d’escalier.
And I’ll second Audrey Tatou and Emmanuelle Béart. Two incredibly gorgeous women, and great actors.
Four words: '94 World Cup team.
A country, I remind you, that’s generally regarded as at best second-tier in this event, never given a chance against the traditional powerhouses like Cameroon, Nigeria, and Argentina.
They advance out of the round-robin easily. In the quarterfinals, they come up against a team that’s deliberately playing for a scoreless tie so their ace goalkeeper can win it for them in the penalty shootout (booooo!), and not only win outright, but with the first ever Golden Goal. And they faced Brazil in the championship game…which is like the Yankees in the World Series…and absolutely flat-out completely blew them away.
As an occasional soccer fan who’s never felt all that strongly either way to the French watching from about 7000 miles away…it was simply awesome to watch.
I can’t really think of much to dislike about the French. Their leaders occasionally act like douchebags but who are us Merkins to talk about dunderheaded leaders?
I went to Paris a couple of years ago by myself and had a grand old time. I met a super nice girl in the airport and we went to the Arc de Triomphe and Le Tour Eiffel (hope I spelled those right.) She barely spoke English and I barely speak French but it hardly even slowed us down.
And then, of course, there’s the whole French New Wave and the concept of Auteur filmmaking, so in a way they gave us Mel Brooks and Kevin Smith :).
Cassis
Les calanques
St-Tropez
Provencal cuisine
Restaurant owners who will let you leave when you’re short on cash “because you’ll come back tomorrow”
wine
bread
Louis Pasteur and his crypt
French fries go so well with burgers! 
Quoi? C’mon people! I am posting #27, and I am the first to mention
Catherine Deneuve!
That’s Madame Catherine Deneuve to you, kid!
There’s so much.
The food. In particular stinky, runny soft cheeses, the bread, the cold meats, the saucisons, the garlic, the soup, salad Nicoise, cassoulet, moules marinières.
The wine.
The architecture. The chateaux. Versailles. The Eiffel Tower. The Louvre. La Défense.
The art. Matisse. Degas. Manet. Monet. Lautrec.
The beautiful-sounding language.
The books. Marguerite Duras. Beaudelaire. Camus. Flaubert. Molière. Rabelais. Francoise Sagan. Proust.
The movies. L’Haine. Diablo Menthe. Cyrano de Bergerac. Indochine. Soudain un ete (?). Jean de Florette. Manon des Sources. Brotherhood of the Wolf. The Battle of Algiers.
Emannuel Béart. Laetitia Casta (hubba). Brigitte Bardot before she became a fascist. Gerard de Pardieu. Jacques Tati. Marcel Marceau (OK maybe not him). Jacques Cousteau.
(Some of) the music. Debussy. Jean Michel Jarre. Serge Gainsbourgh. Erik Satie. Sacha Distel. Saint-Saens.
The gallic shrug: “bouf”, meaning, in my opinion: “Whatever. You do what you like, I’ll do what I like. No skin off my nose”. (I sometimes feel that this attitude is responsible for French diplomatic practices.)
Despite the defeats and capitulation, the courage shown by the French soldiers during the two World Wars. Despite the horror of French colonial rule, the insane toughness of the Foreign Legion.
The inspiration for the Irish independence movement. The Statue of Liberty.
The language
Guillaume Canet
Louis Vuitton
Hermes
Diptyque candles
Tintin was Belgian. As are French fries.
The food. The wine. The chateaux.
Pity about the the politicos.
The Canadians keep them as pets. (Oh, just kidding, lighten up.)
Asterix
I spit in your general direction!
That was the '98 World Cup team and turned France into my favourite European national team. Becoming an Arsenal fan slowly happened right after that.
Zizou!!!
J’ai l’esprix d’escalier parce que:
Sauce bearnaise
La Tour Eiffel
Les employes de poste en la Tour Eiffel
Musee de Louvre
M. et Mme. Robert Jardin en Nice
Fromage, esp. Brie
Sophie Marceau. Sweet mother of god do I find her gorgeous.
Indeed! I loved those books as a kid 
Why did no-one mention Citroen’s? I love their cars from the 50s-70s and they’ve regained a bit of wackiness again in recent years
We used to own a Citroën BX, and it was fantastic.
Anyone (with broadband) who hasn’t seen it yet should check out the superb dancing car ad for the Citroën C4.
'98, right. ‘94 was the one where Brazil barely beat the American squad in the second round and won the championship in a freakin’ PK shootout. (How the hell did I get those two mixed up?? )
Oh, and ditto the music, especially with singing. I haven’t often had the privilege of listening to French singing, but something about it is just incomparable. I really don’t give a damn about anything Kate Ryan did in English.