The 400 Blows (1959) Les quatre cents coups (original title)

Director:

François Truffaut

Writers:

François Truffaut (scenario)
Marcel Moussy (adaptation) ...
(more)

Release Date:

16 November 1959 (USA)

Genre:

Crime | Drama

Tagline:

Angel faces hell-bent for violence.

Plot:

Intensely touching story of a misunderstood young adolescent who left without attention, delves into a life of petty crime.

Plot Keywords:

School | Fondling | Jail | Mother Son Relationship | Police Station

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. Another 6 wins & 3 nominations

Cast

Jean-Pierre Léaud	...	Antoine Doinel
Claire Maurier	...	Gilberte Doinel - la mère d'Antoine
Albert Rémy	...	Julien Doinel
Guy Decomble	...	'Petite Feuille', the French teacher
Georges Flamant	...	Mr. Bigey
Patrick Auffay	...	René
Daniel Couturier	...	Betrand Mauricet
François Nocher	...	Un enfant / Child
Richard Kanayan	...	Un enfant / Child
Renaud Fontanarosa	...	Un enfant / Child
Michel Girard	...	Un enfant / Child
Serge Moati	...	Un enfant / Child (as Henry Moati)
Bernard Abbou	...	Un enfant / Child
Jean-François Bergouignan	...	Un enfant / Child
Michel Lesignor	...	Un enfant / Child
Luc Andrieux	...	Le professeur de gym
Robert Beauvais	...	Director of the school
Bouchon
Christian Brocard
Yvonne Claudie	...	Mme Bigey
Marius Laurey	...	L'inspecteur Cabanel
Claude Mansard	...	Examining Magistrate
Jacques Monod	...	Commissioner
Pierre Repp	...	The English Teacher
Henri Virlojeux	...	Night watchman (as Henri Virlogeux)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Jean-Claude Brialy	...	Man in Street
Jeanne Moreau	...	Woman with dog (as Mademoiselle Jeanne Moreau)
Philippe de Broca	...	Man in Funfair (uncredited)
Jacques Demy	...	Policeman (uncredited)
Jean Douchet	...	The Lover (uncredited)
Marianne Girard	...	(uncredited)
Simone Jolivet	...	(uncredited)
Laure Paillette	...	(uncredited)
François Truffaut	...	Man in Funfair (uncredited)

Directed by
François Truffaut

Writing credits
François Truffaut		(scenario)
Marcel Moussy		(adaptation) (as M. Moussy) &
François Truffaut		(adaptation) (as F. Truffaut)
Marcel Moussy		(dialogue)

Produced by
François Truffaut	....	producer (uncredited)

Original Music by
Jean Constantin

Cinematography by
Henri Decaë

Film Editing by
Marie-Josèphe Yoyotte

Set Decoration by
Bernard Evein

Production Management
Georges Charlot	....	production manager
Robert Lachenay	....	assistant unit manager
Jean Lavie	....	unit manager

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Robert Bober	....	second assistant director
Philippe de Broca	....	assistant director
Francis Cognany	....	second assistant director
Alain Jeannel	....	second assistant director

Art Department
Raymond Lemoigne	....	property master (as Raymond Le Moigne)

Sound Department
Jean Labussière	....	sound assistant
Jean-Claude Marchetti	....	sound

Camera and Electrical Department
André Dino	....	still photographer
Alain Levent	....	assistant camera
Jean Rabier	....	camera operator

Editorial Department
Michèle de Possel	....	assistant editor
Cécile Decugis	....	assistant editor

Other crew
Luce Deuss	....	production secretary
Roland Nonin	....	production administrator
Jacqueline Parey	....	script girl

Thanks
André Bazin	....	dedicatee
Jean-Claude Brialy	....	thanks
Fernand Deligny	....	thanks
Alex Joffé	....	thanks
Jacques Josse	....	thanks
Suzanne Lipinska	....	thanks
Claire Mafféi	....	thanks
Jeanne Moreau	....	thanks (as Mademoiselle Jeanne Moreau)
Claude Vermorel	....	thanks
Claude Véga	....	thanks
Annette Wademant	....	thanks

Production Companies

• Les Films du Carrosse
• Sédif Productions

Distributors

• Cocinor (1959) (France) (theatrical)
• MK2 Diffusion (2001) (France) (theatrical) (new print)
• MK2 Éditions (2001) (France) (DVD)
• MK2 Éditions (2007) (France) (DVD) (blu-ray)
• Curzon Film Distributors (1959) (UK) (theatrical)
• Gala Film Distributors (1985) (UK) (theatrical)
• New Star (2011) (Greece) (theatrical) (re-release)
• Rosebud (????) (Greece) (theatrical) (theatrical re-release)
• Zenith International Films (1959) (USA) (theatrical) (subtitled)
• AV Channel (2003) (Australia) (DVD)
• Alliance Atlantis Home Video (2005) (Canada) (DVD)
• Altomedia. Co. Ltd. (????) (Korea) (DVD)
• Atlantic Film (2007) (Sweden) (DVD)
• BIM Distribuzione (2004) (Italy) (DVD)
• ClassicLine (????) (Brazil) (DVD)
• Criterion Collection, The (1993) (USA) (video) (laserdisc)
• Criterion Collection, The (2004) (USA) (DVD)
• Criterion Collection, The (2009) (USA) (DVD) (Blu-ray)
• Fox Lorber (1999) (USA) (DVD)
• Home Vision Entertainment (HVE) (2003) (USA) (DVD)
• Kinowelt Home Entertainment (2011) (Germany) (DVD)
• Panorama Distributions (2004) (Hong Kong) (DVD)
• Panorama Distributions (2011) (Hong Kong) (DVD) (Blu-ray)
• Umbrella Entertainment (2003) (Australia) (DVD)
• Zima Entertainment (2006) (Mexico) (DVD)

Other Companies

• L'Ecole Technique de Photographie et de Cinématographie  thanks
• S.I.M.O.  auditorium

Also Known As:

"Les quatre cents coups" - France (original title)
"The Four Hundred Blows" - Canada (English title), UK, USA

Runtime:

99 min | Spain:92 min

Country:

France

Language:

French | English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Argentina:13 | Australia:PG | Finland:K-12 | Finland:K-8 (1966) | Singapore:PG | Sweden:15 (original rating) | UK:A (original rating) | UK:PG (re-rating) (2001) | UK:PG (video rating) (1993) | West Germany:16 | Germany:12 | France:U | South Korea:All (2003) | Sweden:11 (re-rating) (1966) | USA:Not Rated

Filming Locations:

Avenue Frochot, Paris 9, Paris, France

Company:

Les Films du Carrosse

Trivia:

The poem written on the board is 'Épitaphe Pour Un Lièvre' by Jean Richepin. It is an Alexandrine poem i.e. comprised of lines of twelve syllables, typical of modern French poetry.

Goofs:

Crew or equipment visible: At the end of the movie, crew footprints can be seen in the sand on the beach.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Petite Feuille:Doinel, bring me that. Indeed! Go to the corner!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Salvador (Puig Antich) (2006)

Soundtrack:

Comment voulez-vous ?

Extraordiany Portrait Of A Parisian Youth - One Of The All Time Greats

In viewing François Truffaut's The 400 Blows for perhaps the fifth time, I finally began to realize its true greatness. Inspired by the director's childhood, The 400 Blows (Truffaut's first film) is primarily about a young boy growing up with his mother and stepfather in Paris and apparently heading into a life of crime. Most adults see the boy as a troublemaker, but in the film, he is meant to be the protagonist.

Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre Léaud) is the boy's name. He is resourceful, quiet, and does what he can to get by. At home, he has a struggling relationship with his parents, especially his mother. She is a woman of curious interests, always distracted by her incommodious son and a secret affair with a man from her job. Antoine's stepfather appears nice enough while treating his son as an equal in a good manner, although he is not really attached to him. However, both parents share common traits: they are away from home quite a bit and do not pay close enough attention to their son. Sadly enough, they only judge him by his behavior and by reports they get from other people.

At school, Antoine's teacher classifies him as a menacing troublemaker. Not that it is entirely Antoine's fault, he just has terrible luck. In the opening scene of the film, we see a poster with a half-naked woman on the front being passed around quietly by the students. The teacher is sitting at his desk with his head down, grading papers, until the poster comes to Antoine and he finds it. He sends Antoine to the corner of the room, where he writes a note of resentment on the wall. As punishment for that, he is to diagram the exact words that he wrote. At home that night, Antoine's homework is interrupted. Because he did not complete it, his good friend René convinces him to skip school the next day, although Antoine is reluctant at first. They walk around France and notice Antoine's mother kissing a man that is not her husband. She and her son make eye contact, but René assures his friend that everything will be alright. The next morning, as the boys return to school, Antoine lies to his teacher and says the reason he missed school was that his mother died. Everything is alright until his mother, furious, arrives at school and her son is immediately identified as a liar.

And yet, we see Antoine alone at home in some private, subtle, and hopeful moments. One of them being, his love for Balzac. He adores him, and we see him reading his biography and lighting a candle in a shrine in his honor at home. One day, at school, the students are proposed to write an essay on an important event in their life, and Antoine chooses the topic of his grandfather's death, in which he incorporates a phrase from his Balzac book. Alas, the teacher identifies this as plagiarism, and sends Antoine out of the classroom, along with René. The two boys stay at René's house for quite some time, living up to the expectations of a life of crime, until they steal a typewriter leaving Antoine caught trying to return it. He is later sent to a juvenile delinquent detention home.

The 400 Blows is not meant to be a tragedy. Rather, it is a character study following Antoine Doinel's life and decisions he makes as a direct result of the many things going on in it. Even The 400 Blows captures a few moments of happiness joy. One of these is a priceless sequence in which a gym teacher is leading Antoine's class for a jog through Paris, not realizing that the boys are peeling off and running away two by two. There is another scene after Antoine's shrine for Balzac catches on fire and his parents are stressing and yelling at him. His mother suggests an outing to a movie theater, where they end up going. After the film, we see the trio in the car, laughing and reflecting on what they had seen. We see this as a moment of hope for Antoine and his family, for this being the only time they are all happy together.

There are many poignant moments however, emerging late in the film after Antoine is caught for stealing the typewriter. His father is fed up with his behavior and escorts him to a police station where he is sent to a jail cell and later in a police wagon full of prostitutes and thieves, with his face peering through the bars, full of tears. His parents discuss with the authorities that they cannot not take him back because they believe he will only run away again. So, in turn, their son is taken to the juvenile delinquent school. These sequences express a reality of Antoine's life, in tune with the outcome of himself. He remains quiet and reserved towards the end of the film, as if he has nothing to say.

The story of Antoine Doinel and his many experiences allow a life to be filled with curiosity and exploration. Every second of the ninety-nine minutes of the film is not wasted. Truffaut allows every minute to be overflowing with creativity while still maintaining the central story of the protagonist. It is not a film that can be taken lightly as a family movie to be watched every Saturday night. It is a film to be given plenty of thought, carefully examined, and given a conclusion. The genius of the film does not rely on that, moreover, it relies on how much is put into the film. Down to the smallest detail, the film is able to maneuver and progress. The story contains elements of sadness, regret, family, warmth, happiness, humor, values, and choices. Just like life itself.