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| Jean
Pierre Léaud, Claire Maurier, Albert Rémy, Guy Decomble,
Patrick Auffray |
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Anamorphic
widescreen |
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Dolby Digital
5.1 |
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DTS |
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Trailer(s) |
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Featurette(s) |
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Documentary |
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Audio commentary
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Deleted scenes
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Concept art
/ storyboards |
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Multi-angle
feature |
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Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre
Léaud): Yes,
I guess I do lie sometimes. Sometimes I tell the truth, and they
don't
believe
me
anyway. So
I prefer to lie.
A young teenage boy in Paris feels
distanced from his environment, resulting in delinquent behavior.
 Although
it ended up spawning an entire cycle of films about the further
life of its main character Antoine Doinel, The 400 Blows is
still best appreciated as an individual work. Its landmark status
as one of the film's that came to define the French New Wave is
fully deserved: based mostly on film theoretician André Bazin's
ideas about transparency, Truffaut creates a picture that is as
vivid and bustling with life as Godard's early films, but also
one that has a more classical sense of dramatic structure and a
true involvement with the characters' lives.
The young Léaud is as natural today as he must have been perceived
back then. Truffaut's direction eschews the predictable 'lovable
urchin' clichés, and portrays him instead as a kid cut off from
his environment by his parents' lack of care and some other bad
luck. But no matter how depressing the narrative would seem to
be, there are still so many moments of humor throughout that the
film never becomes the heavy, sombre experience it easily could
have been. Instead, the film has a unique tone of melancholic optimism,
symbolized by the famous final sequence of breathless escape followed
by bewilderment.
Truffaut first returned to Antoine a few years later in Antoine
et Colette, a 30-minute segment he contributed to the compendium
film Love at Twenty. This miniature masterpiece first
introduces us to an older Antoine, living on his own at the age
of 18, and engaging in his first unrequited love affair. The character
here seems a great distance removed from the boy in The 400
Blows, but his behavior is sharply observed and impeccably
shot and edited. |
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First released as one of the
first titles from The Criterion Collection (with a few extras
and a non-anamorphic transfer), which soon went out of print
and became a valuable collector's item. The film has since
been re-released by the Criterion Collection as part of five-disc
box set containing all five films in the Antoine Doinel cycle
(of which this is the first), boasting a new anamorphic transfer
and numerous extras. The box set release version served as
the basis for this review.
The anamorphic widescreen
image is framed at an aspect ratio of approx. 2.35:1. Lovingly
restored by MK2 in France, this transfer is far superior
to the non-anamorphic version that appeared on Criterion's
rare first release. Blacks are deep, grain is present but
never unnaturally or distractingly so, and the amount of
damage to the print is at a minimum thanks to the wonders
of digital restoration.
The mono sound mix has also been cleaned up noticeably, and
although the music score still sounds mildly distorted, there
is very little hiss on the track, nor are there distracting
levels of damage to the track as a whole.
The first disc in the five-disc
box carries by far the largest selection of extras of any
of the films in the cycle, as well as the 30-minute short
Antoine et Colette in its entirety. The
audio commentary by professor Brian Stonehill
is reproduced from the original DVD (and Laserdisc)
release. The track offers an accessible and highly informative
tour that thoroughly covers the technical and historical
aspects of the film. A new, second
commentary
features Robert
Lachenay,
Truffaut's friend from childhood (and assistant director).
This replaces the commentary from the
old discs that also featured a poor recording of Lachenay
and screenwriter Moussy, which didn't even include any English
subtitles. Happily, that strange omission is fixed
in this
new set,
and
those whose parlez-vous isn't quite up to scratch
may now learn what Lachenay has to say. His insider's view
of the film (in which he is personified himself as Antoine's
friend René) offers a far more personal perspective, but
one that isn't any less entertaining or informative, with
fairly few instances of overlap with Stonehill's more scholarly
comments.
There is also 16 minutes
of uniqe audition footage, including Léaud's
audition and that of two other boys who wound up in various
roles
in the picture. Five minutes of newsreel footage of
the Cannes festival of 1959 provides an arresting
interview
with the young Léaud,
who also appears in a 1965 TV program centering
on Truffaut that runs a little over twenty minutes. Finally,
there is a segment from a 1960 episode of Cinepanorama with
still
more
footage
of
Truffaut
discussing the reception of the picture and his own development
from film critic to director. The theatrical trailer is
also on board.
On
top of this solid list of extras on the first disc, and the
other film-specific supplements on the consecutive discs,
there's a fifth disc titled Les Salades de l'Amour (after
the title of the novle Doinel ends up writing), carrying
extras that pertain to the entire cycle of films rather than
any one film specifically.
Truffaut's
first film as a director, Les Mistons (The
Mischief Makers), from 1957 is the first and most important
extra
here. This short film follows a group of young boys as they
harass a pair of young lovers
in an attempt to come to terms with their own awakening
sexuality. Clearly the work of a young talent in love with
the possibilities of the medium, this slightly pretentious
but captivating effort by Truffaut is
certainly
worthwhile, especially for the notable parallels and contrasts
to The 400 Blows. Film historian Serge Toubiana
provides an introduction to this film, and
there is a full-length audio commentary by
assistant director Claude de
Givray. While not all that scene-specific, the commentary
is rewarding for its insightful comments into the director's
formative years.
Most of the other extras on the disc consist of interviews recorded
over the years. Portrait of François
Truffaut is a a twenty-five minute excerpt from a 1961 documentary by
Serge Leroy, covering the director's early years. Truffaut
does plenty of talking about the creative choices and influences
that went into his first films, while fidgeting restlessly
in a chair before the camera, with overlong clips from his
first few films mixed in.
 Working with François Truffaut is
an excellent set of interviews with de Givray
and writer
Bernard
Revon recorded in 1986
(two years after the director's untimely death).
Among the
many subjects they cover are Lubitsch's influence on Truffaut,
some anecdotes about the director's work habits, and some
gripping insight into projects that were cut short by Truffaut's
sudden passing. The interviews were shot on gritty video
stock, so image quality isn't exactly outstanding, but this
item offers some solid value and never bores.
The final interview is again with Truffaut himself, this
one taken from a 1981 taping of French TV show Champ
contre Champ. Truffaut is very critical here about
the (non–)development of his protagonist throughout his cycle
of Doinel films,
and also goes into some interesting questions about the development
of his own critical views on film throughout his career as
a director. Rounding out the disc is a set of seven pieces
of poster art from
American
and
French
releases
of the Doinel pictures, all of which are handsomely presented
and well-labeled.
 But whoever thinks the wealth ends there, is mistaken. There's
a 72-page booklet included as well, designed
like a French lesson book, with interviews, photos, original
treatments for each film in the cycle, as well as essays
by prominent critics, scholars and filmmakers about the five
films.
As a final note, special mention must go to the box set's
gorgeous packaging. The cardboard box carrying the five discs
and the booklet is designed like a battered old suitcase,
with the slipcases that house the individual discs looking
like
folded
shirts. The disc of extras is designed to resemble the cover
of Doinel's novel as it appears in Love on the Run,
as if the book had been tossed in with his clothes as Doinel
is on the move again. Not only does this packaging look terrific,
it also fits the contents of a cycle of films about a man
who's always on the run. The shirt on each cover resembles
the clothes worn by Doinel in that particular film, and even
the inside of the outer cardboard sleeve has been detailed
to resemble a suitcase. Among the many outstanding packaging
concepts The Criterion Collection has produced in recent
years (including stunners like Fear
and Loathing in Las Vegas and The
Complete Monterey Pop Festival), this set is
easily the most cleverly designed and wittily detailed so
far.
 Like
the other discs in the box set, the animated main menu screen incorporates
a key scene from the film playing in focus in a window at the top
of the screen, and out of focus in the menu screen background.
Navigation design is superlative.
Dan
Hassler-Forest
Reviewed:
August 25, 2003
Click
here for IMDB info on The
400 Blows.
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