The 400 Blows (1959)
NETFLIX SYNOPSIS: Director François Truffaut’s first feature film, The 400 Blows, stars Jean-Pierre Léaud as 13-year-old Antoine Doinel, who runs away from school and his difficult family — but finds it even tougher living on the streets of Paris and must resort to committing petty crimes.
REVIEW: Awards (per Netflix):
1960 Academy Award®: Best Writing Original Screenplay nominee TIME® Magazine List: All-TIME 100 Movies
1961 BAFTA®: Best Film nominee
Review: So much has been written about this film, I hardly know if I’ll be adding anything else new. So my personal feelings then - I’ve heard of this film for a long time, the film that started the French New Wave, the transition between classic and modern film. Even with all I’ve read about this film, and the decades that have passed since it was originally released, the film is still stellar and timeless in my opinion. It hasn’t aged a bit.
This is basically one of the best, if not the best, portrait I’ve seen about adolescence. It’s almost documentary-like in feel, though the cinematography is superlative. Perhaps what struck me the most about The 400 Blows (French slang for “raising hell”) is Truffaut’s portrait of Antoine Doinel - he is the mature adult asking for just a little more understanding while his parents seem to be the immature children who can’t tolerate, won’t understand and won’t empathize. Through a series of misunderstandings at school (with a schoolteacher who is out to get him), he gets thrown into one circle of hell, then a lower circle of hell, until he’s finally thrown out by his parents to go to military(?)/boarding school. The scene where he is thrown into the police car with a bunch of adult violators of the law (prostitutes etc.) is priceless as the camera focuses in on Doinel’s half-childlike, half-adult face, tears rolling down his face.
The repeating, lilting score is a perfect accompaniment to this tale, a tale many think is an autobiographical tale of Truffaut’s own troubled childhood. Truffaut himself has often talked about the fact that film saved him from a fate worse than. This is such a moving tale, yet at the same time, it is unexpectedly lighthearted in tone, funny even. There is a great, famous, hilarious scene where one of the school proctors (P.E. teacher likely) leads his students on an exercise march/walk through the city streets - blowing his whistle at each interval as the little troupe follows behind him in turning and winding through the streets. He starts out with some 30 students, 2 x 15 behind him, and at each turn, a set of students ditches him and peels off, unbeknownst to the teacher. As the exercise continues, more students peel off until the end, when the teacher, still enthusiastically swinging his arms, blowing his whistle and raising his baton, is leading no one but himself - ha! This is beautifully shot too with only aerial shots looking down from on high.
Another Criterion release, the B&W transfer is very sharp and the special features are excellent.
4.5 stars
Audrey
