fashionette2001

I recently received a DVD player as a gift and succombed to temptation, ordering the 2 DVD set of the first season of The Mole. I'd always loved it, in large part due to the witty and intelligent Anderson Cooper as host, but also because of its spectacular European locations (in this series, mainly places in France and Spain--with a few glimpses of Monaco).

This is the only reality show I've ever found which was actually a genuine challenge to one's intelligence *and* a beautifully photographed program to watch. They must have spent a fortune on it; the hotels all appeared to be first class.

Now if only they would issue the second season with all those locations in Italy!

P.S. This is NOT "Celebrity Mole"...

stardust

"The mole" is originally a Flemish concept, probably the only one which ever became a huge international success, and indeed, it's probably the best reality show there is. I kind of feel a little proud about that

fashionette2001

dear stardust,

i'm not really surprised that The Mole concept was not original to the U.S.--but i *am* surprised that the first two seasons were allowed to maintain their high quality without being "dumbed down" for the american audience.

sadly, after Anderson Cooper left to go to work for CNN, it was changed in seasons 3 and 4 to "Celebrity Mole" hosted by former footballer , Ahmad Rashad. at that point, i knew it was no longer of interest to me!

p.s. are you flemish?

stardust

Hi fashionette,

Yes I am Flemish, how did you guess? ;-)
And I'm not familiar with the American version, but I do believe the original makers have tried to supervise the foreign programs as much as possible, as they are an independant company and they value the quality of their programs a lot. Most of the best programs of the last years on Flemish TV have been produced by them (the company is called Woestijnvis btw, which means Desert Fish). We've had 3 seasons here (I guessed the right mole after the 2nd or 3rd episode in each of the seasons), but we leave the Celebrity versions luckily to programs like Big Brother

fashionette2001

<quote>Yes I am Flemish, how did you guess?</quote>

hmmm. lucky guess? ;-)

Viajero2

I considered "The Mole: Season 1" to be the best reality show ever. Absolutely clever with the most interesting locations. I still remembered writing down the names of the towns in Spain and chateau in France because I had never heard of any of them, yet they looked absolutely out of this world (i.e. Sancti Petri, Spain; absolutely gorgeous).

I bought the DVD collection from Amazon.com. Well worth the $15.

stardust

There must be a reason why the original "The mole" won the Golden Rose at the international tv-festival of Montreux in 1999 and was sold to 47 countries...

cobbie

I just ordered season 1 of The Mole from Netflix. It comes on 3 CDs. Can't wait!