I read on another site, that flights over 4 hours are required to perform a safety demonstration before landing in Canada.
Not the whole demonstration but they are required to remind people of the emergency exit locations. As you said, this was probably helpful in this case.
Good job on the AF crew, I fly a lot on them for business and in the air, they are some of the best crews around, very professional. The ground staff at CDG is another story!
My girlfriend is flying in from New York friday on...Air France. She didn't seem worried at all, good girl!