I'm locked out of machine as will not accept password as I shut down while using French keyboard I cannot get into my Mac Book Pro, I just get the password picture which shakes.

The only different key for the password is a which is q on French keyboard but that doesn't unlock either.  I normally work with English keyboard but was using a French keyboard when the machine shut down.

Is there any sequence of keypresses to bypass the password so I can get into the machine?
Or you could change the password to something "keyboard language neutral" via single-user mode. Quoting from Mac OS X Hints


  
  Boot into single user mode (press Command-S at power on)
  Type fsck -fy
  Type mount -uw /
  Type launchctl load /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.DirectoryServices.plist
  Type dscl . -passwd /Users/username password, replacing username with the targeted user and password with the desired password.
  Reboot