I think this film is about people being confined in places they want to escape from. The mother feels trapped in a loveless marriage with a man far older than she is. And she resents the boy as she has a secret about his parentage She has an affair. The boy when playing truant sees the lovers together. The mother acts all lovey dovey to the boy but he wants to escape The apartment in which they stay is very small. A themes are people trying to flee from authority and lies and confinement. There is a wonderful scene where a teacher has a class of boys and as they walk through the town with the teacher leading the boys escape leaving the teacher with only a handful of boys its quite a funny scene. The boy wants to escape from his school and his family as he feels alienated from them and he even tells his teacher that his mother has died to explain a period of truancy. In the end his parents ask the police to place the boy in a youth centre for delinquents and the boy starts having therapy. But he ultimately escapes from the confines of the centre in desperation and runs to the ocean. He at last is free. A good film to compare and contrast with this film is the British film "The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner " both films share many similar themes and both very naturalistic in their depiction of working class struggle to escape from their stifling surroundings. Thank you.
I also had to think of The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, even though i didnt know a film version exists. The short story is also from 1959 so I wonder if it was already influenced by the 400 blows.
This is one of my favorite movies and influenced my becoming a teacher when I saw it around age 20. Truffaut definitely knew how to interact with and film children . I’m French and Truffaut’s screenplay was written in collaboration with the (sadly too little known ) French youth worker and psychology lecturer Fernand Deligny who was especially influential in advising the director to rewrite the ending to make it a run towards the sea and the scene with the psychologist . Deligny’s pioneering work with young people considered « delinquents » and « abnormal » (psychologically troubled /scarred and people on the autistic spectrum) by 1950’s French society in order to improve the way they were being looked after deserves to be better known.
What makes this movie great to me is, even more than the avant guarde cinema technics, or it's stunning cinematography, the realism expressed by the accurate depiction of the ordinary life of a young boy. Everyone has been in at least one of the situations Antoine end up in, so that we can all emaptize with him: it's the greatest movie I've ever seen about preadolescence.
no, though I've been meaning to go through those Truffaut movies about Doinel, which might be worthy of a video on this channel. thank you for mentioning it.
@@LearningaboutMovies it really is and I'd love an analysis; this movie focuses on youth as the first years living by yourself and the way we, somehow, are less alive than the things that surround us. Even love will be forgotten at some point
I love to think of this film as a product of: - You're just a critic, if you wanna talk crap about other people's films grab a camera and do it better. And resulted in: - Well, there you go, give me the mic back because I'm not done.
This is one of the greatest & one of my favorite French movies. Thank you for your analysis Josh. One of the more memorable endings with what to me stood out as themes of lost youth (& why) as well as how many dont fit the constraints of established (in this case post war France) systems & are somewhat discarded for it. We don't have to wonder what happens to him tho since this movie has several sequels showing how the disaffected youth figure out how to navigate into adulthood. Shortfilm Antoine and Colette and feature length Stolen Kisses are the next 2 & are excellent, tho not on the level of this masterpiece. Also this has one of the best child performances in film by Jean-Pierre Laude (who went on to have an excellent acting career)... hope you are doing well, thanks again!
thank you, Jerry. indeed, great mentions of the sequels by Truffaut. Hopefully all of those films will be packaged together one day (or maybe they are and I am not aware of that.)
@@LearningaboutMovies well they used to be, out of print criterion dvd set. Maybe they'll be again someday since criterion periodically reissue their old DVD releases in blu ray (if they still have US distribution rights that is)
Coming from that perspective, it’s interesting how the word Fin is written over him in the end, Maybe to underline the conflict between image and language?
This reminds me of forgotten childhood things that I did that you could call nasty. At 71 years old, I realize I was not full of innocence as a child. The movie works so well because of its star, Jean Pierre.
Great point about Antoine being enthralled by language and how it can be read in parallel with the work of writers like Derrida . A very significant scene that doesn’t get enough recognition in my opinion is Antoine being enraptured by Balzac’s writing (As I remember it’s « Le père Goriot » an interesting choice since it’s both commonly taught in French schools to this day and a story about the intra-familial violence of a loving father being reduced to poverty by his uncaring daughters , reflecting perhaps Antoine’s almost loveless family life with his parents) and being inspired by it to write an essay that’s due for school which his terrible excuse for a teacher interprets as plagiarism which gets Antoine into more trouble (and sets up the famous « My mother died » scene IIRC).
Just got done watching this on HBO Max for the first time what a beautiful film the way it’s shot the way it looks is amazing the coming of age story of Donniel growing up family not understanding him getting trouble for petty things that gave unreasonable punishment it really almost hits home getting in trouble in the juvenile system having to really find his way is just such a great story the mother to me I thought was shady as fuck then when you find out towards the end why he in a way has a dislike towards his mom you kinda see where it’s coming from and the mom kinda thought of Antoine as a burden which took away her youth which she tries to relive and the step father who is trying to discipline his son yet show some kind of care but the family itself doesn’t really understand him I love this the score the way it’s shot it’s a true call back to cinema and why I love it so much.
I have watched this brilliant movie more often than any other. I believe Truffaut is telling the world that every child matters and the dismissive way selfish guardians have treated him and many others is not good enough. The final stare says everything. Ciaran
A seminal French New Wave film that offers an honest, sympathetic, and wholly hearbreaking observation of adolescence without trite nostalgia. I give this a 9.5/10. This is currently ranked on my list as the best coming of age movie of all time. I also think this is Truffaut's masterpiece. This film also made an impact on me along with Ken Loach's Kes and Peter Bagdonovich's The Last Picture Show. Thank you Dr. Josh for reviewing this film. 😊😊👍👍
I think that you did a great job analyzing this great film. For me it has the greatest final scene and freeze frame in the history of film. The first time I saw the last frame was very emotional and has not lost its impact upon further viewing. In my opinion the last shot represents a look into his bleak future in which he will have to face life alone.
I think this film and Small Change are some of the most realistic portrayals of children in film. Compare this film to the portrayal of children in something like To Kill a Mockingbird which came out from America a few years later.
You can spend your life running, yet never able to truly escape that which you are running from…hence the ending when he finds himself on the beach unable to run anymore….🤷🏻♂️
Thanks for the vid man great analysis. You hit on some great points in what is a timeless classic that still feels relevant and artistically ambitious today in 2021. Amazing
Excellent analysis of a great film. It's also a classic among the sub-genre of films which are (primarily) for adult audiences but with children as the primary protagonist(s). Two of my other favorites of this type would be SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE and 11 FLOWERS.
This is a film to be felt within the soul. It's as humane as Chaplin's best, with themes just as eternal, but where Chaplin can't resist 'happy' redemptive endings, Truffaut goes dark. There is no escape, except to confront the void. What had seemed to be arbitrary oppression is merely our response to an infinite meaninglessness. The French "New Wave" stared at the post war return to civilization and found it trivial. It respected our potential by neither shielding, nor coddling us. I would pair this film with 'Jules et Jim' and take both out to see "My Dinner With Andre". The evening would be complete when we all suddenly realized we'd merely been auditioning for "Vanya on 42nd Street". : )
I just watched the film and did enjoy it, and in some instances personally related to it, however one detail I wish had been different. The ending, for me caught me off guard with (what I thought) was that sudden freeze frame. It's apparent that Francois Truffaut wanted an ambiguous ending to his film, but instead of a completely blank expression on the boy's face couldn't he at least have had an expression of ease or contentment. I mean Antoine has gone thought a lot of turmoils throughout the film, can't he at least have this moment of serenity of being truly free, and seeing the ocean at last. I mean he talked about wanting to see the ocean, but yet there is no joy for him when he does finally get there. I would probably find it unrealistic if he were laughing or smiling, but I wanting to see the character at least at ease or at peace for the moment (even if it may be short lived because of his circumstances). Another thought came into my head at the end as well, that even a fishing boat in the not too far distance could elude to him joining up and finding a trade as a fisherman. Some how projecting a plausible future or escape for this adolescent. Unless that is the message the director is forecasting, that this boy has no future he has reached the ocean and has no means of leaving the coastline, he is trapped where he is and he now knows it. There is no where for him to run to with no means of support and this is the end of the line for this kid, his freedom is short lived, he will be caught and be sent back to the institution where he escaped from. I guess since he did achieve his freedom, I wanted him to succeed in some way even if it's on his own terms, by choosing a independent life he would have to work and pull his own weight and it wouldn't be easy. I just wish the director could have given his main character a little hope in that frozen expression looking into the abyss.
One of the things this movie has always said to me is that childhood, whether sweet or bitter, must die. I have always took the freeze frame at the end to be the last second of true childhood for the boy- to go on another second would have bern a shot of another character.
Just watched this for the first time. It’s very hard as a 45 year old to relate to an oppressed 13 year old Parisian boy in 1959. That being said I enjoyed the film. However, I’m not sure it’s one of the greatest movies ever made. Some great scenes and Influential though; no doubt. Good video man 👍
What future lies ahead for the boy? Truffaut was also interested in that question, and he made more movies with Léaud depicting Antoine at later stages of his life.
i finished reading the stranger and about two days later watched this film, without even knowing of the similarities beforehand. Kind of experienced deja vu during the second half, especially at the prison scene and it almost felt like a coming of age adaptation of the stranger in a weird way
I’d be interested in hearing about what you make of other Truffant movies about childhood like « Small change « and Godart’s « Numéro 2 » which is also about children’s lives in a typical 1970s family and interestingly draws a parallel between socialisation in the family and the standardization process of factory goods . Unlike Truffaut however Godard was adamant in having children recite the dialogue he’d written for them even if they had trouble understanding or disagreed with it (he even had the teacher of the girl who starred in Numéro 2 give her lines to copy out as punishment for no reason so he could film a scene where she copies them out which is a really terrible thing to do to a child).
With Doinel's uncertain parentage, with both parents ambivalence to him, and with the timeline of the movie's making and the time it was set in - I always wondered - could Doinel been the result of liason with a German? I think it's one of those things that can probably never be answered definitively yes or no but it doesn't seem to me to be completely out of the question. I think I like to project WWII back stories onto movies - for example I always imagine Rick in Casablanca as being American intelligence!
I have only seen a couple of them. It would be worthwhile to sit down for a week and watch them. Hopefully somebody more knowledgeable will come along and answer this!
Thank you for the great video! What are your thoughts on the significance of the mother's hat in her final scene? It seemed like the young man focused on his mothers hat while she was talking to him.
thank you. great question, and I actually don't know, as I hadn't really noticed. Hopefully somebody comes along and gives interpretations. I'll look for that next time I watch.
May I ask how you got such clear footage from this film? I’m doing an analysis of sorts for school and I desperately need to download this movie (for editing purposes)
for you, borrow it from the library and rip it to your PC. Obviously, disclaimer: delete the mp4 file once you are done with the disc. I own all of the movies I discuss, and I have mp4s of them all, which I use to capture clips. if your library doesn't have this one, shame on them.
There needs to be a film made about that teacher. I thought he was a monster. Reminded me of a shocking relief teacher I had back in school when I was 10. Not as bad as this French one though.
thanks. I say that because, teaching undergraduates regularly, I can see easily how many people just cannot even sit through a decent modern movie, let alone one that's 60 years old and in French. Undoubtedly, this video will be seen by a number of that set, working on papers for their classes.
@@LearningaboutMovies Oh, my! This is really frightening! I guess it has to do with people growing in the internet & the social media world, when concentration is not a merit (since there are new "things" to see every few seconds). I wonder, if they cannot even watch a movie (the one without "big bangs" every few minutes that is), can they read a book?
books are mostly relics, though there will always be a portion of the population (3%?) who enjoy reading. The shocker was a couple of years ago when a student said "I cannot finish a movie." This was a normal, smart, with-it female student. Why not, I ask. Too long, she says, I can only binge TV shows.
@@LearningaboutMovies You and me both, brother 😀 Great review, by the way. Nice to watch someone who doesn't waffle and who knows their stuff. Keep it up. Ps. I'm glad you responded to my facetious comment as it brought me back for a closer look at your channel, and I am now genuinely excited to work through a lot of your videos. For years I've been sitting folks down to watch Mosquito Coast and The Passenger, etc. just to have someone to discuss them with, and I find them and other titles right here!
@@LearningaboutMovies if you like David Cronenberg then you will like Possessor which is directed by his son, Brandon Cronenberg. The apple doesn't fall too far from the tree as they say.
I saw it many years ago and will watch it again but I’d say the problem with this film is despite the great acting, the wonderful cinematography and the painful empathy the audience feel for the protagonist, it’s unconventional ending makes it feel incompl
The FNW may have been more influential than the JNW, but I've personally found the JNW to be more innovative, especially if I were to compare Godard's '60s output to, say, Oshima's: Night and Fog in Japan is more formally daring than anything Godard would do until at least Le Mepris, if not Alphaville, and Oshima's experimentation with jump cuts in Violence at Noon goes a lot further and feels more purposeful than their use in A Bout de Souffle. I don't think any of Godard's sixties films go as far in experimenting with composition and narrative structure as Death by Hanging or The Man Who Left His Will on Film. Credit to Resnais though, he is the only FNW director I've seen so far who I think really compares to the best of the JNW in terms of experimentation. When I start watching Rivette I may have to add him to that list. I'm not aware of any FNW director with the seemingly boundless compositional and editing brilliance of Suzuki, where every shot is just an absolute joy to look at. I think the best works of the Japanese New Wave still today feel so much more aesthetically radical and prescient than the celebrated films of the French New Wave. Films like Eros + Massacre, Go, Go Second Time Virgin, etc. still feel like barely explored aesthetic territory compared to Pierrot le Fou, Cleo de 5 a 7, Les 400 Coups, etc. I haven't seen anything from the FNW quite as biting and aesthetically harsh as the best works of Oshima, Yoshida, Wakamatsu, etc. So as to conclude, in terms of composition, editing, and narrative structure I've gotten a lot more from the JNW films I've seen, which is to a large degree why I ended up gravitating more to them than to the French New Wave, but if you have any FNW recommendations that might change my mind I'm happy to hear them, I'm already looking at getting into Rivette's filmography.
this is a great idea for a video: Godard vs. Oshima. (Well, sort of. Pretty challenging material overall for a RUclips audience of any kind.) You might well be right about the Japanese New Wave. Does this hold true of sound as well?
@@LearningaboutMovies Interesting question, I would be inclined to assume Japan but I don't have any obvious examples at hand. At least in terms of music, I would have to give the edge to the JNW based on Toru Takemitsu's work alone, but I'll have to pay more attention to sound design in those films, something which more often than not is supposed to be unconscious anyway.
@@LearningaboutMovies Bari thekey paliye is 1958's Indian Bengali Cinema directed by Ritwik Ghatak, While the basic storylines - a delinquent boy runs away from home - are similar, the two films make an interesting study in contrasts.
During the the 1960s I have done many things this boy did. The only difference is that I had good parents. I had a horrible teacher like him that just hated me. Hookie was my number one thing and without good parents I would have got locked away. lol I remember doing many things like he did in the movie. Like make a pinhole in the top of a raw egg and the bottom of the egg and suck the egg out of the shell. lol some how to a little boy having a unbroken empty egg shell was cool.
Everything. The direction foremost....The cinematography, acting, story, etc. Whether the French New Wave is actually the most influential movement in cinema is very debatable. You say "possibly" and that is certainly true. Just for the record, I slightly prefer Shoot the Piano Player to 400 Blows--a little more daring in its concept and execution. Not shading 400 Blows in any way.
His view was meh. Life of a child in a loveless family and loveless institutions. Dreams of seeing the ocean and that too is dissapointing (I understand Truffaut wanted the audience to choose). But its realism is what makes it beautiful in a time when Doris Day and Rock Hudson movies were the norm.
i saw it around 10 or a bit more years ago and this movie surprised me in a good way, even though it was made in the 50s . i just looked up and rotten tomatoes 🍅 gave it 98% and deservedly so. . ps. i wished that american movie industry would have dubbed foreign movies but without those idiotic accents, like in the ussr they dubbed all foreign films but with the best actors of that time , and the voice didn't sound overplayed or underperformed. There is no need to make a german movie sound with a hideous german accent when the movie viewer knows that the movie take place in germany, or any other place. and ussr was a shitty place but at least they dubbed movies properly .
@@LearningaboutMovies but then one has to watch it twice because its impossible to read and watch and not to miss something important visually or vise versa .
can you ever imagine hollywood ever make a film like this now ? Hollywood and friends have degenerated so much these days that they can only spit out big budget low IQ fare like , lol, ironman, Aquaman..superman sequel 200 etc etc all with nth sequels
I'm thinking of going to see this movie, so to see a background video about it before I go was great. I appreciated the 'spoiler alert' graphic (think it would also be good to see a 'spoiler alert over' graphic for future vids). Not sure I really understood why you thought it was a great movie though? (felt more like general commentary). Cheers
The difficulty of spoilers is in talking to two audiences at once, those who have seen it and those who have not. Which should defer to the other? Modern trailers don't care about spoilers, interestingly. Most spoil almost everything. I would make my first priority to demand that movie studios stop this, if I did not like spoilers.
@@LearningaboutMovies cheers for responding. I just mean that if you are going to put a spoiler alert up, I’m going to cycle past the video and take a guess at when the spoilers may stop, then start watching the video again and hope I’m correct haha… if you indicate that point that is going to help me in my case
I like your analysis, but I think you're totally overthinking this static vs dynamic stuff. If the kid's running around outside, of course the camera is going to follow him. And if he's in a classroom or small Parisian apartment, of course the camera is going to be on a tripod.
I just got done watching this in my film class got to say this pissed me off the kid was nothing but trouble and his parents were poor leaders for him and didn’t give him the proper guidance. And he better have been glad he was white because had he had been black he wouldn’t have bothered to come home he probably would’ve been whooped with a tree branch, extension cord, and a belt if he lucky this would not fly in a black family.
@@LearningaboutMovies Yeah the kids parents didn’t know what they were doing which really effected him he had no proper guidance and role models to guide him properly and what really ticked me off is that the parents approved of him being grown when he was not. All I got to say is the boy better have been glad he wasn’t black because had he had been black he probably would’ve been dead and he would not want to come home at all a switch extension cords a belt would’ve been waiting for his butt.
I saw this film yesterday, and the whole time I was wondering what happened to the adults that surround Antoine when they were young, beacuse they all look so unsatisfied and frustrated with their lives. By the end of the movie, I understood that perhaps at some point in their lives they also tried to escape, or run, from that fate, but you can escape only to a certain point, and then you have to turn back.
That final shot is so incredibly emotional and I almost can’t understand why. The genius of Truffaut is quite evident.
I think this film is about people being confined in places they want to escape from. The mother feels trapped in a loveless marriage with a man far older than she is. And she resents the boy as she has a secret about his parentage She has an affair. The boy when playing truant sees the lovers together. The mother acts all lovey dovey to the boy but he wants to escape The apartment in which they stay is very small. A themes are people trying to flee from authority and lies and confinement. There is a wonderful scene where a teacher has a class of boys and as they walk through the town with the teacher leading the boys escape leaving the teacher with only a handful of boys its quite a funny scene. The boy wants to escape from his school and his family as he feels alienated from them and he even tells his teacher that his mother has died to explain a period of truancy. In the end his parents ask the police to place the boy in a youth centre for delinquents and the boy starts having therapy. But he ultimately escapes from the confines of the centre in desperation and runs to the ocean. He at last is free. A good film to compare and contrast with this film is the British film "The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner " both films share many similar themes and both very naturalistic in their depiction of working class struggle to escape from their stifling surroundings. Thank you.
very good. haven't seen that British film so I'll check it out.
I also had to think of The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, even though i didnt know a film version exists. The short story is also from 1959 so I wonder if it was already influenced by the 400 blows.
I think that in the final scene he realises that he is also hemmed in by the sea, in other words he is not free. Hence his troubled expression.
@@John_Gilsenan yes I agree, he has no way out.
Final scene is self baptism and he was ready.Tremendous work,forever I hope.
Though its a coming of age movie about a young man, I think the themes of escaping oppressive institutions spans all ages.
yes, certainly. "We don't need no education!"
This is one of my favorite movies and influenced my becoming a teacher when I saw it around age 20. Truffaut definitely knew how to interact with and film children . I’m French and Truffaut’s screenplay was written in collaboration with the (sadly too little known ) French youth worker and psychology lecturer Fernand Deligny who was especially influential in advising the director to rewrite the ending to make it a run towards the sea and the scene with the psychologist . Deligny’s pioneering work with young people considered « delinquents » and « abnormal » (psychologically troubled /scarred and people on the autistic spectrum) by 1950’s French society in order to improve the way they were being looked after deserves to be better known.
What makes this movie great to me is, even more than the avant guarde cinema technics, or it's stunning cinematography, the realism expressed by the accurate depiction of the ordinary life of a young boy. Everyone has been in at least one of the situations Antoine end up in, so that we can all emaptize with him: it's the greatest movie I've ever seen about preadolescence.
thank you.
@@LearningaboutMovies have you seen stolen kisses? That's an other masterpiece considered by many as even better than its prequel
no, though I've been meaning to go through those Truffaut movies about Doinel, which might be worthy of a video on this channel. thank you for mentioning it.
@@LearningaboutMovies it really is and I'd love an analysis; this movie focuses on youth as the first years living by yourself and the way we, somehow, are less alive than the things that surround us. Even love will be forgotten at some point
the ending shot gives me chills.....gr8!
I love to think of this film as a product of:
- You're just a critic, if you wanna talk crap about other people's films grab a camera and do it better.
And resulted in:
- Well, there you go, give me the mic back because I'm not done.
heh, yes.
This is one of the greatest & one of my favorite French movies. Thank you for your analysis Josh. One of the more memorable endings with what to me stood out as themes of lost youth (& why) as well as how many dont fit the constraints of established (in this case post war France) systems & are somewhat discarded for it. We don't have to wonder what happens to him tho since this movie has several sequels showing how the disaffected youth figure out how to navigate into adulthood. Shortfilm Antoine and Colette and feature length Stolen Kisses are the next 2 & are excellent, tho not on the level of this masterpiece. Also this has one of the best child performances in film by Jean-Pierre Laude (who went on to have an excellent acting career)... hope you are doing well, thanks again!
thank you, Jerry. indeed, great mentions of the sequels by Truffaut. Hopefully all of those films will be packaged together one day (or maybe they are and I am not aware of that.)
@@LearningaboutMovies well they used to be, out of print criterion dvd set. Maybe they'll be again someday since criterion periodically reissue their old DVD releases in blu ray (if they still have US distribution rights that is)
Coming from that perspective, it’s interesting how the word Fin is written over him in the end, Maybe to underline the conflict between image and language?
This reminds me of forgotten childhood things that I did that you could call nasty.
At 71 years old, I realize I was not full of innocence as a child.
The movie works so well because of its star, Jean Pierre.
none of us were. thank you for the comment.
Great point about Antoine being enthralled by language and how it can be read in parallel with the work of writers like Derrida . A very significant scene that doesn’t get enough recognition in my opinion is Antoine being enraptured by Balzac’s writing (As I remember it’s « Le père Goriot » an interesting choice since it’s both commonly taught in French schools to this day and a story about the intra-familial violence of a loving father being reduced to poverty by his uncaring daughters , reflecting perhaps Antoine’s almost loveless family life with his parents) and being inspired by it to write an essay that’s due for school which his terrible excuse for a teacher interprets as plagiarism which gets Antoine into more trouble (and sets up the famous « My mother died » scene IIRC).
Just got done watching this on HBO Max for the first time what a beautiful film the way it’s shot the way it looks is amazing the coming of age story of Donniel growing up family not understanding him getting trouble for petty things that gave unreasonable punishment it really almost hits home getting in trouble in the juvenile system having to really find his way is just such a great story the mother to me I thought was shady as fuck then when you find out towards the end why he in a way has a dislike towards his mom you kinda see where it’s coming from and the mom kinda thought of Antoine as a burden which took away her youth which she tries to relive and the step father who is trying to discipline his son yet show some kind of care but the family itself doesn’t really understand him I love this the score the way it’s shot it’s a true call back to cinema and why I love it so much.
excellent, thank you!
I have watched this brilliant movie more often than any other. I believe Truffaut is telling the world that every child matters and the dismissive way selfish guardians have treated him and many others is not good enough. The final stare says everything. Ciaran
A seminal French New Wave film that offers an honest, sympathetic, and wholly hearbreaking observation of adolescence without trite nostalgia. I give this a 9.5/10. This is currently ranked on my list as the best coming of age movie of all time. I also think this is Truffaut's masterpiece. This film also made an impact on me along with Ken Loach's Kes and Peter Bagdonovich's The Last Picture Show. Thank you Dr. Josh for reviewing this film. 😊😊👍👍
thank you!
Extraordinarily beautiful film that moves like a faint memory
For me, this is one of the greatest of all films. It, in effect, sealed my love of film.
I love this movie, I watched this yesterday and it's probably my favorite one already
excellent!
I think that you did a great job analyzing this great film. For me it has the greatest final scene and freeze frame in the history of film. The first time I saw the last frame was very emotional and has not lost its impact upon further viewing. In my opinion the last shot represents a look into his bleak future in which he will have to face life alone.
thank you.
beautiful film, amazing, charming the more i watch it the more i love it. easily in my top ten of all time movies.
I think this film and Small Change are some of the most realistic portrayals of children in film. Compare this film to the portrayal of children in something like To Kill a Mockingbird which came out from America a few years later.
I barely remember Au Revoir les Enfants, but maybe that one too.
I loved Small Change. Thanks to Turner Classic Movies for turning me on to Small Change and 400 Blows.
You can spend your life running, yet never able to truly escape that which you are running from…hence the ending when he finds himself on the beach unable to run anymore….🤷🏻♂️
Thanks for the vid man great analysis. You hit on some great points in what is a timeless classic that still feels relevant and artistically ambitious today in 2021. Amazing
you're welcome.
I adore it. Very few films get to me emotionally; this is one of them.
Excellent analysis of a great film. It's also a classic among the sub-genre of films which are (primarily) for adult audiences but with children as the primary protagonist(s). Two of my other favorites of this type would be SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE and 11 FLOWERS.
This is a film to be felt within the soul. It's as humane as Chaplin's best, with themes just as eternal, but where Chaplin can't resist 'happy' redemptive endings, Truffaut goes dark.
There is no escape, except to confront the void. What had seemed to be arbitrary oppression is merely our response to an infinite meaninglessness.
The French "New Wave" stared at the post war return to civilization and found it trivial. It respected our potential by neither shielding, nor coddling us.
I would pair this film with 'Jules et Jim' and take both out to see "My Dinner With Andre".
The evening would be complete when we all suddenly realized we'd merely been auditioning for "Vanya on 42nd Street". : )
thank you.
I just watched the film and did enjoy it, and in some instances personally related to it, however one detail I wish had been different. The ending, for me caught me off guard with (what I thought) was that sudden freeze frame. It's apparent that Francois Truffaut wanted an ambiguous ending to his film, but instead of a completely blank expression on the boy's face couldn't he at least have had an expression of ease or contentment. I mean Antoine has gone thought a lot of turmoils throughout the film, can't he at least have this moment of serenity of being truly free, and seeing the ocean at last. I mean he talked about wanting to see the ocean, but yet there is no joy for him when he does finally get there. I would probably find it unrealistic if he were laughing or smiling, but I wanting to see the character at least at ease or at peace for the moment (even if it may be short lived because of his circumstances). Another thought came into my head at the end as well, that even a fishing boat in the not too far distance could elude to him joining up and finding a trade as a fisherman. Some how projecting a plausible future or escape for this adolescent. Unless that is the message the director is forecasting, that this boy has no future he has reached the ocean and has no means of leaving the coastline, he is trapped where he is and he now knows it. There is no where for him to run to with no means of support and this is the end of the line for this kid, his freedom is short lived, he will be caught and be sent back to the institution where he escaped from. I guess since he did achieve his freedom, I wanted him to succeed in some way even if it's on his own terms, by choosing a independent life he would have to work and pull his own weight and it wouldn't be easy. I just wish the director could have given his main character a little hope in that frozen expression looking into the abyss.
thank you.
One of the things this movie has always said to me is that childhood, whether sweet or bitter, must die. I have always took the freeze frame at the end to be the last second of true childhood for the boy- to go on another second would have bern a shot of another character.
Just watched this for the first time. It’s very hard as a 45 year old to relate to an oppressed 13 year old Parisian boy in 1959. That being said I enjoyed the film. However, I’m not sure it’s one of the greatest movies ever made. Some great scenes and Influential though; no doubt. Good video man 👍
thank you.
Great stuff. Staticism vs Dynamism is a fascinating concept. I'd love to hear your take on Bergman's films.
thank you.
The most underrated youtuber ever
thank you very much.
What future lies ahead for the boy?
Truffaut was also interested in that question, and he made more movies with Léaud depicting Antoine at later stages of his life.
Having escaped Dien Bien Phu, by age, he observed Americans who didn't.
i finished reading the stranger and about two days later watched this film, without even knowing of the similarities beforehand. Kind of experienced deja vu during the second half, especially at the prison scene and it almost felt like a coming of age adaptation of the stranger in a weird way
excellent coincidence!
I think the ending suggests that true freedom is impossible given the forces the protagonist faces...
I’d be interested in hearing about what you make of other Truffant movies about childhood like « Small change « and Godart’s « Numéro 2 » which is also about children’s lives in a typical 1970s family and interestingly draws a parallel between socialisation in the family and the standardization process of factory goods . Unlike Truffaut however Godard was adamant in having children recite the dialogue he’d written for them even if they had trouble understanding or disagreed with it (he even had the teacher of the girl who starred in Numéro 2 give her lines to copy out as punishment for no reason so he could film a scene where she copies them out which is a really terrible thing to do to a child).
Really informative and interesting. Thanks
I appreciate your brief review. I'll be back.
thank you. you will be welcome.
Love this analysis!! Now I like The 400 Blows even more!
Thanks
thank you!
Love ❤️ this movie 🎥
great!
With Doinel's uncertain parentage, with both parents ambivalence to him, and with the timeline of the movie's making and the time it was set in - I always wondered - could Doinel been the result of liason with a German? I think it's one of those things that can probably never be answered definitively yes or no but it doesn't seem to me to be completely out of the question. I think I like to project WWII back stories onto movies - for example I always imagine Rick in Casablanca as being American intelligence!
Interesting!
Any thoughts on the four sequels that Truffaut made to show the progression of Antoine Doinel’s life?
I have only seen a couple of them. It would be worthwhile to sit down for a week and watch them. Hopefully somebody more knowledgeable will come along and answer this!
Great review, I'll check it out! You like all the great movies I do!
thank you. great minds think alike.
Excellent video of this wonderful movie❤
"Great Expectations" --Yes!
thank you.
I didn’t know David cross liked movies this much
I should try to grow my beard that long. Unfortunately my glasses' prescription is too thick for any camera to love.
Thank you for the great video! What are your thoughts on the significance of the mother's hat in her final scene? It seemed like the young man focused on his mothers hat while she was talking to him.
thank you. great question, and I actually don't know, as I hadn't really noticed. Hopefully somebody comes along and gives interpretations. I'll look for that next time I watch.
May I ask how you got such clear footage from this film? I’m doing an analysis of sorts for school and I desperately need to download this movie (for editing purposes)
for you, borrow it from the library and rip it to your PC. Obviously, disclaimer: delete the mp4 file once you are done with the disc. I own all of the movies I discuss, and I have mp4s of them all, which I use to capture clips.
if your library doesn't have this one, shame on them.
There needs to be a film made about that teacher. I thought he was a monster. Reminded me of a shocking relief teacher I had back in school when I was 10. Not as bad as this French one though.
I had one in second grade. maybe we all had one or more like this. which helps us sympathize with the ending, perhaps.
How can anyone hate this movie????
wait, who does? Did I say that in the video? or is that just a rhetorical exclamation?
@@LearningaboutMovies "This movie, even if you hate it, even if you do not connect with it, you have to respect it!" ;)
thanks. I say that because, teaching undergraduates regularly, I can see easily how many people just cannot even sit through a decent modern movie, let alone one that's 60 years old and in French. Undoubtedly, this video will be seen by a number of that set, working on papers for their classes.
@@LearningaboutMovies Oh, my! This is really frightening! I guess it has to do with people growing in the internet & the social media world, when concentration is not a merit (since there are new "things" to see every few seconds). I wonder, if they cannot even watch a movie (the one without "big bangs" every few minutes that is), can they read a book?
books are mostly relics, though there will always be a portion of the population (3%?) who enjoy reading. The shocker was a couple of years ago when a student said "I cannot finish a movie." This was a normal, smart, with-it female student. Why not, I ask. Too long, she says, I can only binge TV shows.
I loved it. ty for your analysis.
you're welcome
David Cross knows his French cinema
if only I had David Cross' wealth ...
@@LearningaboutMovies You and me both, brother 😀 Great review, by the way. Nice to watch someone who doesn't waffle and who knows their stuff. Keep it up.
Ps. I'm glad you responded to my facetious comment as it brought me back for a closer look at your channel, and I am now genuinely excited to work through a lot of your videos. For years I've been sitting folks down to watch Mosquito Coast and The Passenger, etc. just to have someone to discuss them with, and I find them and other titles right here!
Some new 2020 films you might want to check out: Possessor, Another Round, and First Cow
great, I have added them to my watchlist. much appreciated.
@@LearningaboutMovies if you like David Cronenberg then you will like Possessor which is directed by his son, Brandon Cronenberg. The apple doesn't fall too far from the tree as they say.
Why is the name "The 400 Blows"? I didn't find any connection between the story and the name
I believe the answer is on Wikipedia.
"faire les 400 coups" is an old french expression that roughly means doing 400 bad tricks, or "raising hell". The title was poorly translated.
I saw it many years ago and will watch it again but I’d say the problem with this film is despite the great acting, the wonderful cinematography and the painful empathy the audience feel for the protagonist, it’s unconventional ending makes it feel incompl
The FNW may have been more influential than the JNW, but I've personally found the JNW to be more innovative, especially if I were to compare Godard's '60s output to, say, Oshima's: Night and Fog in Japan is more formally daring than anything Godard would do until at least Le Mepris, if not Alphaville, and Oshima's experimentation with jump cuts in Violence at Noon goes a lot further and feels more purposeful than their use in A Bout de Souffle. I don't think any of Godard's sixties films go as far in experimenting with composition and narrative structure as Death by Hanging or The Man Who Left His Will on Film. Credit to Resnais though, he is the only FNW director I've seen so far who I think really compares to the best of the JNW in terms of experimentation. When I start watching Rivette I may have to add him to that list.
I'm not aware of any FNW director with the seemingly boundless compositional and editing brilliance of Suzuki, where every shot is just an absolute joy to look at. I think the best works of the Japanese New Wave still today feel so much more aesthetically radical and prescient than the celebrated films of the French New Wave. Films like Eros + Massacre, Go, Go Second Time Virgin, etc. still feel like barely explored aesthetic territory compared to Pierrot le Fou, Cleo de 5 a 7, Les 400 Coups, etc. I haven't seen anything from the FNW quite as biting and aesthetically harsh as the best works of Oshima, Yoshida, Wakamatsu, etc.
So as to conclude, in terms of composition, editing, and narrative structure I've gotten a lot more from the JNW films I've seen, which is to a large degree why I ended up gravitating more to them than to the French New Wave, but if you have any FNW recommendations that might change my mind I'm happy to hear them, I'm already looking at getting into Rivette's filmography.
this is a great idea for a video: Godard vs. Oshima. (Well, sort of. Pretty challenging material overall for a RUclips audience of any kind.)
You might well be right about the Japanese New Wave. Does this hold true of sound as well?
@@LearningaboutMovies Interesting question, I would be inclined to assume Japan but I don't have any obvious examples at hand. At least in terms of music, I would have to give the edge to the JNW based on Toru Takemitsu's work alone, but I'll have to pay more attention to sound design in those films, something which more often than not is supposed to be unconscious anyway.
Does the sea represent freedom... or yet another barrier?
Or both!
This is a great great film!
This movie inspired from “Bari Thekey Paliye"
hmm, what's that?
@@LearningaboutMovies Bari thekey paliye is 1958's Indian Bengali Cinema directed by Ritwik Ghatak, While the basic storylines - a delinquent boy runs away from home - are similar, the two films make an interesting study in contrasts.
During the the 1960s I have done many things this boy did. The only difference is that I had good parents. I had a horrible teacher like him that just hated me. Hookie was my number one thing and without good parents I would have got locked away. lol I remember doing many things like he did in the movie. Like make a pinhole in the top of a raw egg and the bottom of the egg and suck the egg out of the shell. lol some how to a little boy having a unbroken empty egg shell was cool.
Everything. The direction foremost....The cinematography, acting, story, etc. Whether the French New Wave is actually the most influential movement in cinema is very debatable. You say "possibly" and that is certainly true. Just for the record, I slightly prefer Shoot the Piano Player to 400 Blows--a little more daring in its concept and execution. Not shading 400 Blows in any way.
Not bad video, man!))
thank you.
Great Review......
thank you.
Yes..yes it is period
My favorite movie
excellent, and I was not expecting Eric Cartman to say that.
I think much more about a little boy all on his own.
I don't know why the title got that idiotic translation. "Faire les 400 coups" means "to raise hell".
His view was meh. Life of a child in a loveless family and loveless institutions. Dreams of seeing the ocean and that too is dissapointing (I understand Truffaut wanted the audience to choose). But its realism is what makes it beautiful in a time when Doris Day and Rock Hudson movies were the norm.
I’ve heard guys were in their early 20 year olds viewing this as the seeds of goth with the black clothes.
hmmm, maybe?
Stepfather messed up moms,too young and immature
i saw it around 10 or a bit more years ago and this movie surprised me in a good way, even though it was made in the 50s .
i just looked up and rotten tomatoes 🍅 gave it 98% and deservedly so. .
ps. i wished that american movie industry would have dubbed foreign movies but without those idiotic accents, like in the ussr they dubbed all foreign films but with the best actors of that time , and the voice didn't sound overplayed or underperformed. There is no need to make a german movie sound with a hideous german accent when the movie viewer knows that the movie take place in germany, or any other place. and ussr was a shitty place but at least they dubbed movies properly .
thanks. I prefer subtites and the original audio, whenever possible.
@@LearningaboutMovies but then one has to watch it twice because its impossible to read and watch and not to miss something important visually or vise versa .
maybe, though I live under the possible illusion that I can read the subtitles and watch everything else, all at the same time.
@@LearningaboutMovies i knew a guy in jail and he sang, read , and listen to music all at the same time , so may be you versatile like that
can you ever imagine hollywood ever make a film like this now ? Hollywood and friends have degenerated so much these days that they can only spit out big budget low IQ fare like , lol, ironman, Aquaman..superman sequel 200 etc etc all with nth sequels
I'm thinking of going to see this movie, so to see a background video about it before I go was great. I appreciated the 'spoiler alert' graphic (think it would also be good to see a 'spoiler alert over' graphic for future vids). Not sure I really understood why you thought it was a great movie though? (felt more like general commentary). Cheers
The difficulty of spoilers is in talking to two audiences at once, those who have seen it and those who have not. Which should defer to the other?
Modern trailers don't care about spoilers, interestingly. Most spoil almost everything. I would make my first priority to demand that movie studios stop this, if I did not like spoilers.
@@LearningaboutMovies cheers for responding. I just mean that if you are going to put a spoiler alert up, I’m going to cycle past the video and take a guess at when the spoilers may stop, then start watching the video again and hope I’m correct haha… if you indicate that point that is going to help me in my case
A metaphor for Those in The Gaza strip.
I like your analysis, but I think you're totally overthinking this static vs dynamic stuff. If the kid's running around outside, of course the camera is going to follow him. And if he's in a classroom or small Parisian apartment, of course the camera is going to be on a tripod.
this has not been the way that literary criticism has worked, for at least 6000 years.
Tony Khan has had more blows than this. oops sorry i forgot this wasnt the pro wrestle subreddit
well... blow*
I just got done watching this in my film class got to say this pissed me off the kid was nothing but trouble and his parents were poor leaders for him and didn’t give him the proper guidance. And he better have been glad he was white because had he had been black he wouldn’t have bothered to come home he probably would’ve been whooped with a tree branch, extension cord, and a belt if he lucky this would not fly in a black family.
I don't know which is worse, that or the French solution to discard your child into what's basically a kids' prison.
@@LearningaboutMovies Yeah the kids parents didn’t know what they were doing which really effected him he had no proper guidance and role models to guide him properly and what really ticked me off is that the parents approved of him being grown when he was not. All I got to say is the boy better have been glad he wasn’t black because had he had been black he probably would’ve been dead and he would not want to come home at all a switch extension cords a belt would’ve been waiting for his butt.
I saw this film yesterday, and the whole time I was wondering what happened to the adults that surround Antoine when they were young, beacuse they all look so unsatisfied and frustrated with their lives. By the end of the movie, I understood that perhaps at some point in their lives they also tried to escape, or run, from that fate, but you can escape only to a certain point, and then you have to turn back.
good point. thanks.