Revolutionary Paris. Filthy Cities

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Description

Just over 200 years ago, Paris was one of the dirtiest cities in Europe. How did that suffocating urban environment give way to what we now know as the City of Light? This program sifts through the story of the French Revolution in the context of urban filth and its close link to social injustice. Depicting the settings in which thousands of Parisians toiled in toxic industries and suffered grotesque poverty and disease, the film profiles one of the foulest jobs in history-tanning leather-and comes face-to-face with the ultimate killing machine, the guillotine, which exhausted the city's cemeteries during the Reign of Terror. A visit to Marie Antoinette's private rooms at the glittering palace of Versailles offers further insight into the deep-rooted inequality that helped spark a bloody, transformative revolution. A BBC/Discovery Co-production.