MAKSQUIBS CINEMATHEQUE: THE 400 BLOWS / LES QUATRE CENTS COUPS (1959)

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RECOMMENDED - Meaning Strongly Recommended. A film that's good enough or historically important enough to demand viewing. WARNING: A few real stinkers are important enough to rate this label. And, on the other hand, lots of pretty good or pretty valuable films, don't quite measure up to our RECOMMENDED level. (See also UNIQUE, below.)

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LINK - To quickly find any Write-Up that includes an InterNet Link of interest for that specific film.

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(Hint: most of the posters will enlarge if you click on them.)

WATCH THIS, NOT THAT - sort of like those EAT THIS, NOT THAT diet books only with film instead of food as the topic. Sometimes, the substitute pick isn't the obvious 'better' choice, but one of those 'flawed-but-interesting' films that often get left behind.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID - some easy to miss element worth noting.

SILENT FILM - hey, figure it out (LOL)

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Like just about everyone with an interest in the movies, I'm watching more films on DVD and going out to movie houses a lot less. Convenience trumps the better experience.
Of course, you lose audience interaction and the poor film now has to compete with all the comforts of home.
It's a bit like seeing Rembrandts & Titians in a book reproduction, or from posters with iffy color values, no texture or weight to the surface and the wrong dimensions . . . all while snacking on chips & soda. (Oops! You get that at your local cinema,too.)
The ease of instant movie gratification risks turning an art form (well, sometimes) into little more than low-grade eye-candy & mindfodder. So, maybe it's worthwhile to write a bit down on what we're all viewing, just to keep fully engaged.

DVDs: the latest opiate of the people meets the internet, where everyone's a critic.
God help us.

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Thursday, May 25, 2023

THE 400 BLOWS / LES QUATRE CENTS COUPS (1959)

Claude Chabrol may have been first out of the gate (with LE BEAU SERGE/’58), but it was François Truffaut, contentious critic turned preternaturally fluid filmmaker, who kick-started cinema’s Nouveau Vague revolution with his debut feature, a film even more autobiographical than generally thought.* Proceeded only by LES MISTONS/’57, a charming 2-reel warmup, Truffaut got cinematographer Henri Decaë to shoot b&w ‘Scope (the only New Waver to debut in WideScreen?) for this epically intimate story of an unruly, misfit 14-yr-old dead set on turning delinquent. Barely tolerated at home or school, Truffaut alter-ego Jean-Pierre Léaud is unable to hold off his worst instincts: playing hooky with a best pal; lying his way into more trouble when he’s caught; stealing spare change and hardware (which he’s unable to fence); he’s on a one-way road to Juvie Jail. Tough, mordant & consistently hilarious, with indelible moments of stolen childhood bliss before the inevitable self-inflicted payback, Léaud’s Antoine Doinel remains a cursed yet unstoppable life force, a heroic screwup with a future. Hence the legendary end shot. While the unsung hero of the film (other than that little kid who destroys an entire Composition Book in two minutes flat) is probably co-writer Marcel Moussy who organized a solid structure from Truffaut’s stockpile of auto-biographical wrong turns and bold-relief memories. The film still something of a miracle.

READ ALL ABOUT IT: *Truffaut biographers Antoine de Baecque and Serge Toubiana lay it all out in their denser than dense 1996 bio. (Published Stateside 1999.)

DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: *LES MISTONS immediately before and the mid-career SMALL CHANGE/’76 are the Truffaut films closest to BLOWS (https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2010/11/les-mistons-1957.html; https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2008/06/small-change-1976.html) while Jean Vigo’s ZERO DE CONDUITE/’33 something of a lodestar. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2012/05/complete-jean-vigo-1930-34.html

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Our Japanese poster (above), with Léaud half-hidden by his turtleneck was Truffaut’s preferred poster. Here’s the oddly triumphant one made for France.

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Thursday, May 25, 2023

THE 400 BLOWS / LES QUATRE CENTS COUPS (1959)

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