Not entirely true (I'm French BTW). In a lot of companies if you're engineer or similar you're "cadre", and not subject to the 35h/week limitation: you have flexible work day hours. There's still a maximum limit, I think you must have at least 10h of rest a day but don't quote me on that one. To compensate for the more than 35h/week work days you do have more vacation days call RTT for "Reduction du Temps de Travail" (Work Time Reduction). It's about 8 days per years, on top of regular vacations.