The 400 Blows Review: Truffaut’s Confessio

The 400 Blows is a film about a boy who cannot stay still. It is the directorial debut of François Truffaut, and it plays like a confession: Truffaut is Antoine Doinel, and Antoine is Truffaut, and the film is a record of how it felt to be misunderstood as a child. It is one of the best films ever made, and it earns every bit of that reputation.

The film follows Antoine Doinel, played by Jean-Pierre Léaud, through a year of his life in Paris. He skips school, steals, runs away from home, and lies to his teachers and his parents. He is not a monster, and the film never treats him as one. He is a boy trying to make sense of adults who do not understand him, and the cruelty of his world is the film’s engine. Truffaut shoots the film in Paris and Honfleur, and the locations carry as much weight as the performances. This is a film about a boy and the city that rejects him, and the city is never a neutral backdrop.

Truffaut wrote the script with Marcel Moussy. The film runs 99 minutes, and every scene earns its place. Antoine skips school and is punished for it. He steals a typewriter from his stepfather’s workplace, thinking it will fund his escape. He is caught, sent to jail, and then placed in an observation center for troubled youths. The failures pile up fast.

Trailer, via BFI.

Léaud’s Antoine

Jean-Pierre Léaud carries the film. His Antoine is not a pretty boy, and Truffaut does not soften him. He is restless, sarcastic, and occasionally cruel. He skips school and writes on the classroom wall. He lies about his mother’s death to get out of trouble. He steals. He runs away. Léaud’s performance is a study in small, precise gestures, and every one of them tells you what Antoine is thinking before he says it. He is the only actor in the film who is given real room to breathe, and he uses it.

The adults around him are drawn in sharper, more exaggerated strokes. Albert Rémy plays Antoine’s father, a man who does not know how to speak to his son. Claire Maurier plays his mother, a woman who is more concerned with appearances than her child’s well-being. Georges Flamant plays Mr. Bigey, a teacher who is openly hostile to Antoine, and Patrick Auffay plays René, Antoine’s friend who is not a good influence. These performances are not subtle, and they do not need to be. The point is not to make the adults sympathetic. The point is to show how alone Antoine is.

Truffaut also includes a number of his friends in bit parts. Philippe De Broca appears in the funfair scene, as does Jacques Demy as a policeman. Jean-Luc Godard and Jean-Paul Belmondo appear as overheard voices in the print works scene. Truffaut is not hiding these cameos. He is showing his world, and the world he shows is small and specific.

The Judge, the Mother, and the Typewriter

The film’s turning point comes when Antoine is caught with the stolen typewriter. His stepfather turns him over to the police, and Antoine spends a night in jail, sharing a cell with prostitutes and thieves. The scene is brief, but it is brutal. Antoine is not a criminal, but the system treats him like one. He is a boy who has made a mistake, and the mistake has consequences. He is sentenced to the observation center, and the film follows him there.

The center is near the seashore, as his mother wished. A psychologist looks for reasons for Antoine’s unhappiness, and Antoine answers in a fragmented series of monologues. He talks about his grandfather, about school, about the people who have failed him. The monologues are not cathartic. They are a record of his frustration, and they end without resolution. The film does not offer one.

The Beach, the Ocean, and the Freeze-Frame

The film’s final sequence is a boy running to the sea. Antoine escapes from the observation center, runs under a fence, and runs to the ocean. He reaches the shoreline and runs into it. The film ends with a freeze-frame of Antoine, and the freeze-frame is followed by an optical effect that zooms in on his face as he looks into the camera. It is a moment of pure poetry, and it has been copied a thousand times since.

The freeze-frame is a refusal. It says that Antoine’s story does not end here, but it also says that the film has no obligation to show you how it ends. Truffaut leaves the boy at the water’s edge and lets the image do the work. It is a quiet, powerful ending, and it has stuck with audiences for more than sixty years.

Awards, Nominations, and the Sight & Sound Poll

The 400 Blows is the first in a series of five films in which Léaud plays Antoine Doinel. It is followed by the short film Antoine and Colette, and then by three sequels: Stolen Kisses, Bed and Board, and Love on the Run. The film’s influence is visible in every coming-of-age story that followed, from American Graffiti to The Breakfast Club. It is a film that changed the shape of cinema, and it remains essential viewing for anyone who wants to understand how a director can make a film about a boy feel like a true story.

The film had 4.1 million admissions in France, making it Truffaut’s most successful film in his home country. It received the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Director, the OCIC Award, and a Palme d’Or nomination in 1959. It was also nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay in 1960. The 2022 Sight & Sound critics’ poll of the greatest films ever made ranked it 50th, and it ranked 33rd in the directors’ poll on the same list.

A Boy and the City That Rejects Him

The 400 Blows is a film about a boy who cannot stay still, and it is a film about a city that will not let him. It is a film about the cruelty of adults, and the cruelty of the world. It is a film about a boy who is punished for being alive. It is a film that is funny, sad, and beautiful, and it is a film that has not aged. It is the best film ever made, and it deserves the title.

The film is a record of a boy’s life, and it is a record of a director’s first great work. It is a film that is worth watching, and it is a film that is worth remembering.

classic cinema · François Truffaut · Jean-Pierre Léaud · new wave · The 400 Blows