François Truffaut’s portrait of a neglected Parisian boy deserves its reputation. Jean-Pierre Léaud makes Antoine’s mischief and vulnerability equally convincing, even when the music presses a little too hard for sympathy.
The 400 Blows understands how a boy can be troublesome and still be badly treated. We would recommend François Truffaut’s film to anyone who remembers being told off before they had managed to explain themselves. Antoine Doinel, played by Jean-Pierre Léaud, lies, skips school and tests the patience of his parents. Truffaut lets us enjoy some of that behaviour, then makes us notice how little patience the adults had to begin with.
Léaud never tidies Antoine up for our benefit. The mischief is enjoyable, but there is enough defiance in the performance to make us understand why an adult might lose patience with him. His vulnerability comes through without a constant appeal for sympathy, which is why the neglect hurts. We are free to find him difficult; that does not make the adults’ treatment of him any easier to bear.
Henri Decaë’s photography makes Antoine’s Paris seem worth skipping school for. There is pleasure in looking at the city, and that helps us feel the temptation of being out in it with no adult in charge. Marie-Josèphe Yoyotte’s editing gives the wandering enough room to seem like part of his life, not simply an interval between offences. The pace can be loose, but we would miss that freedom if every scene existed only to bring the next punishment closer.
The children’s faces at the Punch and Judy show moved us more than we expected. Truffaut gives their enjoyment serious attention, and for a moment the pleasure of watching is enough to fill the screen. It is a welcome reminder of how much there is to childhood beyond the behaviour that attracts adult notice. Coming from a film so concerned with a boy’s troubles, that interest in what children enjoy feels generous without turning them into little angels.
The adults are less evenly served. Claire Maurier as Gilberte and Albert Rémy as Julien have the difficult job of making grown-up impatience credible alongside Léaud’s confusion and defiance. Both resist making the adults merely hateful, although we sometimes wanted a fuller sense of their lives away from Antoine. Truffaut’s closeness to the boy occasionally narrows what he is prepared to see in everyone else.
Jean Constantin’s music sometimes encourages the sympathy a little too firmly. Its warmth makes the sadness easier to settle into, when Léaud has already given us enough reason to care. That is a small irritation, particularly beside the uncertainty that the performance allows. The boy is interesting enough without musical reassurance about what we should feel for him.
Truffaut draws on his own neglected childhood, and his affection for Antoine can make him protective. It also helps explain the care he takes over the pleasures of books, films and truancy. Coming-of-age dramas can be too eager to make childhood look enviable; there is little danger of that here, even when Antoine is enjoying himself. Its 99 minutes require no knowledge of film history. See it with someone who remembers school rather differently from you.
