Ce film est intéressant au début, mais la fin est vraiment ennuyeuse.

to be

Breakdown of Ce film est intéressant au début, mais la fin est vraiment ennuyeuse.

• intéressant: interesting
• à: at
• ce: this

Questions & Answers about Ce film est intéressant au début, mais la fin est vraiment ennuyeuse.

Why is it Ce film and not Cet film or Cette film?

French demonstrative adjectives agree with the gender and number of the noun:

• ce = this/that (masculine singular, before a consonant): ce film
• cet = this/that (masculine singular, before a vowel or mute h): cet homme, cet arbre
• cette = this/that (feminine singular): cette histoire
• ces = these/those (plural, any gender): ces films, ces histoires

Because film is masculine, singular, and starts with a consonant sound, you must use ce → Ce film.

How do I know that film is masculine?

Unfortunately, grammatical gender in French often has to be memorized. There are some patterns, but many exceptions.

In practice:

• Look words up in a dictionary. You’ll see (n.m.) for nom masculin or (n.f.) for nom féminin.
• When you learn a noun, learn it with its article: un film, le film (masculine); une histoire, la histoire → actually l’histoire (feminine).

So you memorize un film / le film and that tells you the gender.

Why is it Ce film est intéressant and not ?