The 400 Blows
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| The 400 Blows (Les Quatre Cent Coups) |
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 original film poster |
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| Directed by | François Truffaut |
| Produced by | François Truffaut |
| Written by | François Truffaut Marcel Moussy |
| Starring | Jean-Pierre Léaud Claire Maurier Albert Rémy Guy Decomble |
| Music by | Jean Constantin |
| Cinematography | Henri Decaë |
| Distributed by | Cocinor |
| Release date(s) |  May 4, 1959 November 16, 1959 |
| Running time | 99 min. |
| Language | French |
| All Movie Guide profile | |
| IMDb profile | |
- This article is about the French film. A 1980s jazz/funk band were named after the film; see 400 Blows.
Les Quatre Cent Coups (The 400 Blows) (1959) is a French film directed by François Truffaut.
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[edit] Overview
One of the defining films of the French New Wave, the film displays many of the characteristic traits of the movement. The story revolves around Antoine Doinel, an ordinary adolescent in Paris, who is thought by his parents and teachers to be a trouble maker. The title of the film is a French idiomatic expression which means roughly "Raising Hell". Legend has it the young Weinstein brothers attended "The 400 Blows" believing it to be racy European fare. They were so moved by the experience it led to a deep and enduring love of film and eventually to their founding Miramax.
This film's story is autobiographical, reflecting many of the events of Truffaut's own life. The film's style amounts to an autobiographical history of French film, most notably a scene borrowed wholesale from Jean Vigo's Zéro de conduite. It is dedicated to the man who became his spiritual father, André Bazin, who died just as the film was about to be shot.
The 400 Blows is, besides a character study, an exposé of the injustices of the treatment of juvenile offenders in France at the time.
[edit] The film
Antoine was born while his mother was unmarried (as is revealed later in the film). Afterwards she married an older man to "give him a name." She is unhappy in her married life and resents Antoine because of this. The family is financially insecure, and Antoine is poorly dressed and poorly fed, and sleeps in a sleeping bag (which he prefers because "at least it's warm") on a cot crammed next to the back entrance to the apartment. Both his mother and his step-father consider him an unwanted burden.
He engages in a series of childish pranks, usually at the instigation of his schoolmates, and bears the blame for each of them. Eventually, at the instigation of his friend René, he pilfers a typewriter from his father's workplace. After he and René find that it cannot be pawned, he attempts to return it. When he is apprehended by the night-watchman (or, perhaps, the concierge) his step-father turns him in to the police.
After his arrest his mother effectively surrenders control over him to the investigating magistrate, saying that he is incorrigible, leaving him to the "mercy" of the French judicial system. Antoine is put in a detention center, and then a work camp.
His mother makes no plea for leniency, rather she agrees to his commitment to the work camp. During his interrogation at the detention center it comes out that, instead of being raised with his mother and step-father, he has usually been shuffled off to his other relatives.
Antoine eventually escapes and runs towards the sea. The film ends on the famous freeze-frame where Antoine is on a beach with his feet in the surf, looking back to the shore, with no place left to run. He had never seen the sea before.
[edit] Awards
The film was widely acclaimed, winning numerous awards, including the Best Director award at the 1959 Cannes Film Festival, the Critics Award of the 1959 New York Film Critics' Circle and the Best European Film Award at 1960's Bodil Award. It was nominated for Best Original Screenplay at the 1959 Academy Awards, and lost to Pillow Talk.
[edit] Other Antoine Doinel films
Truffaut made four other films with Léaud depicting Antoine at later stages of his life. He meets his first love, Colette, in Antoine et Colette, which was Truffaut's contribution to the 1962 anthology Love at Twenty. He falls in love with Christine Darbon (Claude Jade) in Stolen Kisses, he marries Christine in Domicile conjugal (Bed and Board), but the couple have separated in Love on the Run.
[edit] Cast
- Jean-Pierre Léaud: Antoine Doinel
- Claire Maurier: Gilberte Doinel, the mother
- Albert Rémy: Julien Doinel
- Guy Decomble: The French Teacher (Sourpuss)
- Patrick Auffay: René Bigey
- Georges Flamant: Monsieur Bigey
- Pierre Repp: The English Teacher
- The Children: Daniel Couturier, François Nocher, Richard Kanayan, Renaud Fontanarosa, Michel Girard, Henry Moati, Bernard Abbou, Jean-François Bergouignan, Michel Lesignor;
- Avec Luc Andrieux, Robert Beauvais, Bouchon, Christian Brocard, Yvonne Claudie, Marius Laurey, Claude Mansard, Jacques Monod, Henri Virlojeux.
[edit] Crew
- Photography by Henri Decaë
- Camera: Jean Rabier, asst.: Alain Levent, stills: André Dino
- Editing by Marie-Josèphe Yoyotte
- Music by Jean Constantin
- Sound by Jean-Claude Marchetti with Jean Labussière
- Set design by Bernard Evein
- Adaptation and Dialogue by Marcel Moussy
- Direction and Screenplay by François Truffaut
- Direction assisted by Philippe de Broca, Alain Jeannel, Francis Cognany, and Robert Bober
- Production Supervision by Jean Lavie with Robert Lachenay
Dedicated to the memory of André Bazin.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Les Quatre cents coups at the Internet Movie Database
- Criterion Collection essay by Annette Insdorf
- Roger Ebert on The 400 Blows
- Senses of Cinema essay
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The Adventures of Antoine Doinel by François Truffaut |
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The 400 Blows | Antoine and Colette | Stolen Kisses | Bed & Board | Love on the Run |
| Preceded by: Amarcord |
The Criterion Collection 5 |
Succeeded by: Beauty and the Beast |
