Reviews (86)

Great film about a bleak future
This review is for those (like me) who haven't read the book. There, now we can talk about just the movie. Oskar Werner stars as Montag, an unhappy man living in a monotonous futuristic society. Books are illegal, Big Brother-style screens are on every wall, emotions are out, and people take drugs to endure their bleak lives. Montag is a fireman whose job it is to find hidden books, burn them, and arrest the owners. One day he becomes curious about these books and sneaks a copy of David Copperfield home. His spaced-out wife (Julie Christie) turns him in to the authorities and he must run for his life. He runs to a free-thinker (also played by Christie) who is a book-lover.

Oskar Werner is wonderful as the sensitive, confused fireman who longs to really connect with people, ideas, and feelings. Christie shines in two very different roles: the glamorous but bored housewife and the brave ex-teacher who dares to read books. The music contributes to the intense and dangerous mood of this film. Its view of the future is frightening and sad, where paranoia the norm; but the ending is quite hopeful and touching. I recommend this movie to those who have not read the book; you are free to enjoy it without comparing it to the novel. The script, actors, and direction are all excellent.

blahh science fiction - but good drama and social comment
First of all - I did not read the book. - So I cant make that comparison. But I have seen the movie a number of times.
If you are interested in drama and symbolism - this film is replete - but if your interest is science fiction - you will be sorely disappointed. This is a very good film - very subtle - considering its content. Give it some patience and time - there is much more depth then its initial viewing might suggest. I was initially disappointed - for the acting by the main character seems bland, the sets seem trite and there is lack of grandeur and dynamic range for a science fiction film - but the film really shines in its understated drama and symbolism especially when dealing with choice, freedom, relationships, censorship and the forbidden fruit of knowledge. The music by Bernard Hermann is excellent - For the price and with a number of very good extras -the DVD is a steal. I personally I don't particularly like Truffaut,s work for its lack of in your face emotional drama- but I appreciate him more from seeing this film numerous times. The DVD is from a very good print. -The DVD is in mono but sounds good - no hiss.

Skill and High Art.
This is Fahrenheit the way it was meant to be. Truffaut is a master film maker. I also recommend "Two English Girls" and "Jules and Jim" as well. It's impossible not to think of the Heinrich Heine quote, "Where one burns books; one will soon burn people" while watching it. The inversion of a fire fighters who, rather than put out fires, start them was a very innovative idea on Bradbury's part. The main character is quite compelling and easily evokes our sympathy. This work is prescient and timeless. In today's talk show era, do books still not remain dangerous and subversive?

Beware the Four-eyed Snake of 451!
In Ray Bradbury's renowned novel FAHRENHEIT 451,the ubiquitous TV set is ONE-EYED SNAKE. This was our nation's foremost story teller's metaphor for SATAN himself. Poisonous pap of televison programing--as moronic narcotic--was Bradbury's ingeniously ironic reversal of Biblical Forbidden Fruit TEMPTATION. Books (Written Word,THE LOGOS) became singluar source of SIN. A near future, Government-issue-drug stupored, anti-child, PC society run by fascist oligarchs and policed by FIREMEN (licensed to burn books and Readers to death)was Bradbury's arch parody of the Culture of Death's Garden of Eden.

Francois Truffaut gamely tries to capture the suicidal listlessness...Unholy Spirit...of The 451 NATION. The anti-grace of Death is cinematically characterized by repeated sequences of autoeroticism(masturbation)by myriads of vacant-eyed,zombie-like citizens. That these lack erotic power(or even quality of the mildly perverse)conveys the pathetic depths to which a once-dynamic people has deprived itself of its own humanity.

Even "depravity" requires too much energy of this narcisscist culture embracing rank stupidity in the name of equality. IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH proclaimed Orwell in 984.CYRIL CCUSACK...who essays role of THOUGHT POLICEman in the Richard Burton-featured adaptation of 1984...is BEATTY, consummate GRAND INQUISITOR and high priest. Oscar Werner is superb as MONTAG his would-be acolyte successor. Thematic climax of the film consists of ritual burning of a hidden, forbidden LIBRARY;and martyrdom death of a woman who refuses to "live" life of non-being "distracted"...as T.S. Eliot observed...from distraction by DISTRACTION.

Julie Christie plays dual and pivotal roles. She is CLARISSE,the young heroine...in the novel, a 17 year old wunderkind...who initiates/converts Montag into the world of books and THE BOOK PEOPLE. [The Book People are remnant who flee 451 Society to memorize books. These persecuted enemies of the State become LIVING books, whose "leaves will one day be "for the healing of the nations." Julie Christie also plays LINDA. [In the novel she's named Mildred, Bradbury's allegorical personification of damned/damp "dust". She is Mordred anti-woman/Judas]. Linda betrays Montag(reports him to Beatty). He READS aloud an excerpt from a 19th century romantic novel and offends her child-hating friends. [One is ironically named Clara. Another...particularly repugnant...is named Mrs. Bowles: 30'ish;thrice-married/twelve abortions-so-far, narcisscist whose most recent husband blew his brains out.] Most damningly Montag's public READING of forbidden literature jeopardizes Linda's standing in THE(Virtual)TELEVISION FAMILY.[ Wall Screen 3D-TV conclaves comprising idiotic glamour show participation; and membership in "reality"-interactive serial-SOAP OPERAS ]

Unlike the novel--climaxing with nuclear annihilation of the 451 Nation--Truffaut's 451 ends with thematic ambiguity paralleling its principal filming technique. Sometimes photography is in the "wash-out" grey colors which frequently characterize Euopean movies. Sometimes it blazes with colors of killing flames; or nihilistically numbs with GESTAPO jet black uniforms of Firemen sealed with the scourge/flash of the Phoenix-rising-from- pyre flames in triumph. 1966 Critics apparently failed to appreciate(grasp?) Truffaut's cinematic metaphors(an APPLE is strategically eaten by Book People or initiates. The Forbidden Fruit is manifestly bidden to humanity's new Adam & Eves)...

It's said Ray Bradbury--over the past decade--previously submitted three scripts for a 451 update(and was tempted by offering Sean Connery as Beatty). But Hollywood Homies mangled 451 of intellectual impact with TERMINATOR-action ambience consigning subtlety or chance of religious/mythical metaphor to the flames. Another try is promised in 2005. NOW that Michael Moore has offended Mr. Bradbury by plagiarizing not only his greatest work's title but bastardizing its essence(which IS about Freedom:The Logos/Word(s)that sets one Free)in a puerile comprise of dreck and propaganda, one of America's few genuine literary geniuses has "cried havoc". Bradbury threatens to set loose the dogs of legal war on the Four-Eyed Snake.What the result will be, quien sabe? It's possible not only renewed study of a literary masterwork will ensue; but revived interest in a cult film...more or less consigned to cinematic dustbin...will acknowledge the reel FAHRENHEIT 451 as minor,but worthy achievement in its own right. Whatever Moore and his media lackies end-up calling "'Fahrenheit'9/11",irony of his effort at pirating a literary gem of political-religious mythology might well turn firey wrath on PC's pitiful Captain Beatty clone.(451 Stars!)

A dark future perhaps not so far
To have a book is verboten (forbidden). And those people who still read them, will be punished.
Thsi statement is the central nervous of that film. The sequence of a woman reading a comics without words is a cruel methapor of a world that reminds us to the book's burn in the Reichstag in the thirties.
Julie Christie, an extraordinary actress and a true icon of the sixties, steals the show. Oskar Werner as Montag is OK.
A film who'll disturb and will let you thinking.
A must for you to watch it.
The paper burns at 451 Farenheit degrees. ... Read more

Reviews (55)

Classic film about childhood
Anyone interested in Francois Truffaut or the French New Wave could scarcely do better than to start here. Unlike some other classic films, one doesn't need to be a film buff to enjoy this. One only has to like good films.

Jean-Pierre Leaud is terrific as Antoine Doinel, a lonely Parisian boy who lives with his neglectful mother and flaky step-father. At school, Doinel has become a target of wrath for his sadistic English teacher. Doinel begins to hang out more and more with his deliquent friend. Together, they skip school, go to the amusement park, and watch films (the young Truffaut was an avid movie watcher).

Truffaut's Paris is certainly not a friendly place for children. Parents are neglectful and teachers are more interested in bringing students into line than in teaching. Indeed Doinel's English teacher seems to believe in harsh punishments over the most minor offense. The more the world tries to bring Doinel into line, the more he is compelled to rebel. Finally, Doinel steals a typewriter to be pawned to pay for his escape from home. Having a change of conscience, he tries to returns it, but is caught and sent to a home for juvenile delinquents.

Truffaut directs this semi-autobiographaphical film with great feeling, showing us the humor, triumph, and most of all sadness of his tragic childhood. The widescreen black & white photography of Paris is beautiful so be sure to see this letterboxed.

A rather delightful drama for young and old alike
I just saw Francois Truffaut's 400 Blows again, and this indeed is the epitomy of the New Wave by making a story which can be seen like a French neo-realist reaction, and being as such it gets its chance to shine in the hands of the debut Truffaut. It's a lovely, wonderful cinema experience.

In a partially autobiographical tale, Truffaut's protagonist is Antoine Doinel, a pre-teen-ish youth who can be identified with by most who are at or older than his age viewing his tale- he hates school, goes to the movies as escape, and has parents who tend to be over-bearing and un-attentive. After a string of events occur (one of which getting thrown out of his school) he tries to live on his own, which proves un-successful in a caught theft, which gets him into an "observatory for delinquent youth", or juvenile prison.

One of the truly fascinating qualities of the film is that it all goes along in a totally naturastic manner, or at least natural for the characters presented, and there aren't any over-stylings to go along with the drama. The stylings that are apparent give the film a perfect balance: the spellbinding scene on the carnival-twister, the un-broken shot of the boy running down the road, and shots that add emotional weight merely by the time allowed on the object. And this is all worthy of a younger audience as well; even those who don't watch foreign movies could consider this their must-view as an introduction to the genre.

400 Blows
I've spent decades avoiding THE 400 BLOWS, afraid it was either dark and brooding, or a documentation of child abuse (physical and/or emotional), or an angry and vindictive assault on the authors' of Francois Truffaut's traumatic childhood.
I shouldn't have worried. THE 400 BLOWS is a gentle and compassionate movie. It isn't overwhelmed by its anger, although a few characters, particularly the coming-of-age hero's mother and his school teacher, aren't terribly sympathetic. Being new to THE 400 BLOWS, I found the commentary by Premiere magazine film critic Glen Kenny especially helpful in understanding French New Wave cinema in general and Truffaut in particular. By the way, according to Kenny "400 blows" refers to a French colloquialism similar to the American "paint the town red." It means to give oneself over to every type of excess, and raise a little heck in the process.

The quintessential film of the New Wave
Since the first images you stan by literally caught by the huge poetry who emerges. The sad opening theme with a cloudy Paris as frame gives us a striking clue about the film explores.
With the amazing exception of Forbidden games (Rene Clement) never before a movie had drown in the child's universe like these two films.
Truffaut is far from making a statement. His camera simply spies the emotive familiar nucleus of this nice guy and the terrible troubles generated by his own parents.
We laugh, and cry with the disventures and irreverent madness made outschool. The portrait of Balzac burning is a high point in the picture. It's a long journey in the world of this child that well might be you and me if...
The plot is very organilcal, and the final sequence is brethtaking.
Hopeless and a sense of desperation seems surrounding us when you watch by the last time to our youn boy.
Forget about all the films that followed to this one in the New Wave, like Breathless, les cousins, or Jules and Jim of Truffaut also.
This is the gem of the New Wave cinema.
In memory of the great Andre Bazin, the creator of the Cahiers du cinema.
A must for everyone.

Not a very good movie.
I don't mind slow movies, but this movie is slow + boring and 100% predictable. In my opinion, it's terrible. ... Read more

Reviews (11)

Its not about love for an Officer
Isabelle Adjani plays an obsessed woman who will go to any length to get the attention of Officer Pinson in the story of Adele H. However, what becomes apparent is it's not he who she is taken with but rather the idea of love and the sacrifice. Truffaut wrote Officer Pinson as an unworthy character to show Adele as a woman who wanted to proclaim the purity of her love. And as the film moves on you begin to feel for the bothered Officer because it becomes a joke really, that she chose him; it could have been anybody, by proving the purity of her heart she can prove her moral superiority to her father Victor Hugo, the most famous man in the world. I enjoyed this film and think its the funniest of Truffauts' films at times because Adele goes all out; there is nothing she will not stoop to and she is extremely devious. The real Adele Hugo was much older when she made this trip across the ocean to Halifax and lived to be 85 years old spending 40 years in an asylum writing in her diary in a secret code, later the diary was discovered in a New York historical library and with much struggle Truffaut brought her story to film. The film has great depth and if you like history and great cinematography you wont be disappointed. The story of Adele H relies on the point of view of one character who is completely strung out and it is a tribute to Truffauts' genius that he was able to pull it off. The film is haunting because it is a conversion narrative about a woman realizing herself in self-destruction. This is a frighteningly intelligent film.

Flawed Truffaut, Flawless Adjani.
Being a fan of Truffaut and having seen such great movies of his as THE BRIDE WORE BLACK, THE 400 BLOWS, and THE WILD CHILD i expected this film to be as great but unfortunatly it was not as great as the ones i have mentioned but it is not one of Truffaut's worst either. It manages to make the cut because of great direction, cinematography, costumes, sets, locations, and most of all because of Isabelle Adjani's great and haunting performance, a performance for which she was nominated for the Academy Award for best actress and an award she should have won but which she lost to Louise Fletcher for ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST. She portrays the daughter of Victor Hugo, Adele Hugo (hence the H in the title). The story is based on true events which were recorded in a diary the real Adele kept. Adele falls in love with a soldier she met in France and soon after he leaves her and goes to Halifax, Nova Scotia. The movie begins by showing us Adele arriving in Nova Scotia and from then on we see her try to win her love back but he reveals he had no serious intentions with her and she becomes obsessed with getting him back. She has little pride and dignity and she does what she has to do to get him back and we see her suffer and through journal entries and letters we understand what she is going through psychologically. But for some reason the movie never becomes totally emotioanlly involving which is the problem. If it had it would have been a masterpiece. I think this might be due to the script in some way. But if not for Adjani this might have been a mediocre movie. You can't take your eyes off her delicate beauty. As Truffaut once said "you could make a movie about just her face." Also look for a cameo by Truffaut as a soldier who runs into Adjani on the street.

One of the major achievements of Truffaut!
This is a must in your collection. The charismatic and sideral beauty of Isabelle Adjani enriches itself for her gifted talent as actress .
I don't think in any other actress in that age (with the exception of Shygulla or Jill Claybourgh ) who were capable to win the this defiant performance . This role is hyper difficult and Adjani carries to cosmical levels.
The story turns around the hopeless relation between Adele and a french officer. She leaves everything in France for join him : but the result is useless.
The slow of the progressive madness of Adele is told with such richeness of creative talent , that you wonder why Adjani didn't win the Academy Award with this one.
The picture is perfect in every little detail. A winner and one of the most perfect french films in the seventies.

Wow
This movie is a life story of Adele Hugo, the daughter of the famous Victor Hugo.
You must watch this movie and learn what True Love really is!

I'd give my both arms for a wife like Adele yet the man she was obsessed with didn't care at all about her!

A must see movie!

A wonderful French movie with a beautiful actress!
Isabelle Adjani again takes on a role of the rejected lover. This is the true story of Victor Hugo's daughter Adele, who enamoured of a military man, follows him to Halifax and refuses to accept his rejection. She does a fine job of depicting a young lady who has gone off the edge. The story is reminiscent of her portrayal of Camille Claudel, another excellent movie. Isabelle Adjani is beautiful to look at and does a fine job of portraying Adele. I enjoyed this film very much. For those who do not understand French, there are moments when English is used throughout the film. The subtitles do justice to the French. ... Read more

Reviews (32)

ONE OF THE BEST MOVIES OF THE SIXTIES
Five or six years before the " Peace and Love " movement that erupted in the United States and shocked a prude nation, French director François Truffaut, in his third movie, JULES & JIM, dared to film a love story between one woman and two men. And there was no guilt in sight ! Jeanne Moreau's love for Oskar Werner and Henri Serre was as innocent as the beautiful song she sang in the movie.

Fançois Truffaut must absolutely be rediscovered one of these days because all the fuss made about his New Wave companion, Jean-Luc Godard, has hidden the fact that his filmography is one of the more personal and interesting of the second part of the XXth century.

For once, Winstar has put a lot of goodies in this DVD. A commentary, a dozen trailers of other Truffaut's movies, filmographies and a tribute to Jeanne Moreau (in fact, a few scenes put one after the other while Jeanne is singing the well-known song of JULES & JIM).

Images and sound are average (there is alas ! only one Criterion...) but imperfections disappear behind the fulgurant modernity of this 1961 movie.

A DVD for your library.

Truffaut's best?
This film, The Man Who Loved Women, and Stolen Kisses rank as my three favorite Truffaut movies, and I have seen them all except for Such a Gorgeous Kid Like Me. Poor audio and poor image quality may make any other film a waste to purchase on DVD, but not this one. Breathtakingly filmed, acted, and directed, this is one of the best films in movie history. Simply THE best French New Wave film. One aspect of Truffaut's movie direction that is truly his own, is the way the camera will stay on a scene long after the main actors are out of the shot. Most often the camera stays on some other minor characters who have nothing to do with the movie. Little things such as these late cuts are what sets Truffaut above the rest (high above Godard in my opinion). Without Jeanne Moreau, the film would be good but not great. The two male leads are exceptional as well. Films like this one are perfect reasons why all movies should be seen in their widescreen aspect. The scene with Bassiak, Moreau, Werner, and Serre, all on screen at the same time in the cottage is magnificent. It doesn't get much better than this in movie making.

THIS PURE TRIANGULAR LOVE
"She is the greatest sweetheart in French cinema. While gangsters and gangs kill each other, she dances in a tutu in a circus, is tortured by a sadist and makes her way through bursts of submachine-gun fire, with thoughts only of love. With trembling lips, wild hair, she ignores what others call 'morals' and lives by and for love. Messieurs, producers and directors, give her a real part and we will have a great film."

Francois Truffaut wrote this of Jeanne Moreau in 1957. Shortly afterwards, when fascination turned to friendship, the burgeoning director's greatest ambition would be to make a film with the woman who had become the most important person in his life.

In JULES ET JIM, Jeanne Moreau's is a performance of touching beauty and lucidity that is unparalleled in cinema. She is Catherine, the woman in love with life, who in turn falls in love with both Jules and Jim (superb performances from Oskar Werner and Henri Serre), amateur scholars, dandies, and the closest of friends. Over the following years, through joy, disillusionment, a world-war and parenthood, the three share a relationship that defines love itself; as Catherine alternates her pledge of devotion from Jules to Jim, and even to other men, our heroes explore a friendship that has been touched by a soul who is "not a woman" but rather "...an apparition".

But Catherine is not "fatale"- rather the very essence of woman, whose divine right it is to live as she pleases, when she pleases, where any potentially ruinous consequences are the unfortunate fruits of an unmitigated love of love itself. Truffaut's art is one that invokes the Goddess, embodied here by an enigma of extraordinary grace and power. His camera laughs with her, cries with her, and encapsulates with amazing dexterity the flow of movement - the whirlwind of life. The theme of JULES ET JIM- a triangular love affair that questions monogamy - is unhindered by any sensuality or sexual intimations. Instead it is a love that is pure, chaste and eternally resonant. The remarkable tact of Truffaut's direction, the refutation of showiness, conveys a cinema of charm and elegance, as the film's mood undulates in accordance with the whims of our great love Jeanne Moreau - from untold joy to the heavy burden that is the awful truth.

JULES ET JIM is a film of harmony and genius, a hymn to life that asks the audience not to judge, but rather to experience and to love. We can relate to the film Truffaut's own words, when, speaking of Nicholas Ray's JOHNNY GUITAR and Howard Hawks' BIG SKY he said: "Anyone who rejects either should never go to the movies again, never see any more films. Such people will never recognize inspiration, poetic intuition, or a framed picture, a shot, an idea, a good film, or even cinema itself."

Overrated
I got Jules et Jim because I saw 400 Blows, thought it was the best movie, and wanted to see more Truffaut. Unfortunately, Jules and Jim did not have nearly the same greatness of 400 Blows.
Jules and Jim is a love triangle, about two best friends who fall in love with the same woman (Jeanne Moreau) and have a 20-odd year menage a trois. Of course, none of the principles age at all, there is a child whos introduced and then pretty much ignored, and one wonders how three people pay rent when all they seem to do for years and years is sit around in a huge chalet sipping beer, smoking cigarettes and having sex. This is the movies, I can understand these things.
However, what "killed" this movie for me was that underneath the cool cinematography and clever, chic narration, was at heart a very silly love story. Sure, there are famous images, like Therese the kept girl "steam engining" a cigarette. The menage a trois is really just a cheap soap, and thus the "tragedy" seems tacked on and hollow. Jeanne Moreau plays Catherine is a sulky, quite possibly manic-depressive siren, but she's so irresponsible and annoying one can't even sympathize with Jules and Jim for their obsession. Jules (Oskar Werner) and Jim (Henri Serre) are ciphers, and their friendship never quite understandable. In the end, the only way a kind of unconventional love story like this can work is if the characters are either likeable or interesting. Jules, Jim, Catherine, as well as Albert (who seems to criss-cross country lines in pursuit of Catherine -- how did these people get visas?) are neither. The movie's early scenes have a narrator with droll commentary, but this is largely lost in the later, more melodramatic parts of the movie. Catherine finally becomes so unbearable that I literally couldnt stand to see her onscreen anymore.
Basically I think this is a movie that makes the Top Ten lists because "everyone" thinks they should like it. I wonder why. The whole thing reeks of artificiality -- there's screaming and crying aplenty, but the total effect is numbing. For instance, why does Catherine nearly have a nervous breakdown when she can't conceive with Jim? She already has a daughter with Jules. I would gather that in 1961 the film was avant-garde, with a frank storyline of adultery without any moralizing. But I admit that in this case a little moralizing might have done some good: the characters are all so self-absorbed and selfish that glorification of this movie as a great romantic drama seems not only inappropriate but obscene.

A meditation on freedom
It doesn't suprise me that at least a 1/4 of the reviews here are from people who cannot understand why this movie is so beloved. Most people these days watch movies as spectacle. This film will give back whatever you invest in it. If you invest nothing, you get nothing.

As I've gotten older, this movie has become more and more emotional for me. The characters briefly live out a kind of reckless and carefree nirvana. They then spend the rest of the film trying to recreate the feeling. But as time goes on, entanglements creep in. Children are born. Wedding vows are taken. Friendships are tested. Which of us over 30 cannot relate to this?

The last line of the film, a seemingly tacked on detail about a request made to a civil servant, sums all that has come before with pure poetry. A final plea for freedom is made, but..."it was not to be permitted". ... Read more

Amazon.com

François Truffaut's third feature, though it's named for the twobest friends who become virtually inseparable in pre-World War I Paris, iscentered on Jeanne Moreau's Catherine, the most mysterious, enigmatic woman in his career-long gallery of rich female portraits. Adapted from the novel by Henri-Pierre Roché, Truffaut's picture explores the 30-year friendship between Austrian biologist Jules (Oskar Werner) and Parisian writer Jim (Henri Serre) and the love triangle formed when the alluring Catherine makes the duo a trio. Spontaneous and lively, a woman of intense but dynamic emotions, she becomes the axle on which their friendship turns as Jules woos her and they marry, only to find that no one man can hold her. Directed in bursts of concentrated scenes interspersed with montage sequences and pulled together by the commentary of an omniscient narrator, Truffaut layers his tragic drama with a wealth of detail. He draws on his bag of New Wave tricks for the carefree days of youth--zooms, flash cuts, freeze frames--that disappear as the marriage disintegrates during the gloom of the postwar years. Werner is excellent as Jules, a vibrant young man whose slow, melancholy slide into emotional compromise is charted in his increasingly sad eyes and resigned face, while Serre plays Jim as more of an enigma, guarded and introspective. But both are eclipsed in the glare of Moreau's radiant Catherine: impulsive, demanding, sensual, passionate, destructive, and ultimately unknowable. A masterpiece of the French New Wave and one of Truffaut's most confident and accomplished films. --Sean Axmaker ... Read more

Reviews (37)

Just watch it already
I love film, plain and simple. I'm 16 and if there's one thing i'm sure about in my life, it's that. I had heard things about this film here and there, calling it one of the finest works of art ever. Well, I recently started viewing old film, and stubborn as I am, I don't like to listen to pretentious "film lovers" who say this crap, I like to formulate my own opinion. So what is my opinion? Just watch it already. I don't care if you know who Francois Truffaut is or if you've seen any of his other work, because in a film like this, it doesn't matter. It's fast paced and hard to follow at times, and at other times it just moves a bit too slow, but it does it with style and with grace that other movies could only dream of having. So just go ahead and watch this thing already, it's worth it no matter what you think in the end.

The BEST French New Wave film!Truffaut's best?
There are so many great Truffaut films, it's very hard for me to decide in what order they rank, but certainly, this film wouldn't be out of place being labeled as his best.Breathtakingly filmed, acted, and directed, this is simply one of the best films in movie history. Simply, it's THE best French New Wave film.It's also the best love triangle ever captured on film.

Without Jeanne Moreau, the film would be good but not great.She's the reason why viewers should have no trouble believing that the two leads spend a lifetime loving this far from perfect character.Oskar Werner and Henri Serre are exceptional as well.

One aspect of Truffaut's movie direction that is truly his own, is the way the camera will stay on a scene long after the main actors are out of the shot. Most often the camera stays on some other minor characters who have nothing to do with the movie. Little things such as these late cuts are what sets Truffaut above the rest (high above Godard in my opinion).

Poor audio and image quality on the previous US release make this Criterion DVD a must!Films like this one are perfect reasons why all movies should be seen in their widescreen aspect.The scene with Bassiak, Moreau, Werner, and Serre, all on screen at the same time in the cottage is magnificent.This scene, with Moreau singing Le Tourbillion La Vie with Bassiak on guitar, is my favorite in the film.It doesn't get much better than this.

The youth's frenzy!
This landmark film is one the best personal achievements of Truffaut and somehow is the second part of The 400 blows in which the dramatic structure narrative concerns. The wonderfulstorytelling pulse is one of its undeniable virtues.

The idealized world of the golden age and the visible contradictions between the youth surrounding and the oppressive real world are shown with this admirable genius touch that Truffaut owned. Jules and Jim live their own codes and explores everything they want whether is forbidden or not. It is the pleasure and delight of experiencing by itself, his freedom expectations and hallucinating dreams.

Something inside in my mind tells me that the final sequence in Jules and Jim must have influenced the extremely similar ending of Thelma and Louise of Riddley Scott thirty years after.

Coincidence or simple random involuntary manifestations?

One of the quintessential films of the French Wave Cinema!

Screen Sparkle
So much has been said already about this jewel of the French New Wave. This is my second time around with Jules and Jim, and this time I listened to the commentary. Apparently François Truffaut was a film critic and then he put his ideas onto film.His style resembled the romantic fashion of French novelists. "He filmed with a pen" was the commentator's suggestion. If this movie told a linear story line of a lovers triangle as in so many inferior movies, it would not intrigue, but Truffaut attempts nothing less than to explain the nature of romantic desire or the meaning of life, whichever comes first.

Jeanne Moreauis the queen of all women in this film and the men love her, idealize her, and acknowledge her superiority over all womanhood.The boys meet this young coquette and she dresses as a boy.Jim paints a mustache on her lip and Jules and Jim chase here across a platform bridge. This is filmed from behind and along side of Moreau. These are signature takes of French Cinema, unique, original, and never to be forgotten. Moreau is indeed lifted up in youthful splendor.She is not the most beautiful woman ever says Jules, but she is the woman.I'm paraphrasing, but as the three grow older, they are trapped in Katherine's insane web of female art.

The ticket purchasing public has rejected black and white cinematography late in the 20th Century.Once, the silver screen glowed with light and shadow. Black and White makes bad actors seem competent and great actors and actresses magnificent. Truffaut borrowed the cinematographer from Goddard, I can't recall his name, but this fellow makes the screen sparkle.There were two fog scenes towards the end of the movie, which are incredible mood enhancers. In truth, this film is a sad story, but it is beautiful sadness, a plate of light cuisine that is remembered fondly forever.

What the............
I pride myself with a good appreciation of fine cinema. My collection consists mainly with the works of directors like Bergman, Tarkovsky, Kurasawa, Angelopoulos, Antonioni, Rosellini and Egoyan. Wishing to broaden my appreciation of great cinema I decided to read the reviews written by critics and viewers in the hope of tracking down more great films. "Jules and Jim" had excellent reviews so I decided to buy it. What a dissapointment. I kept saying to myself "am I seeing the same film?" I persisted viewing the film till its conclussion. To give the film a chance I decided to view the film again the next day before writing this review. The only part of the film that was brilliant was the great acting performance of the lead actress. Unfortunately that was not enough to save the film. I found the camera style amateurish, performances by the two male actors boring and the story disjointed. I am sure that at the time the movie was released it received rave reviews but seen today it qualifies as a B grade movie. Don't waste your money. The only reason the film has a great reputation is because of the famous director. Had anyone else been the director, the film would have been a non event. ... Read more

Reviews (8)

A Funny and Emotional Ride
Truffaut's "Shoot The Piano Player" is a remarkable thing: a funny and light-on-its-feet movie about despair. The director combines the grittiness of David Goodis' noir novel "Down There" with his own more optimistic humanism and the full stylistic arsenal of the French "New Wave" to create a film that manages to say as much about Art and Life as any really good, satisfying book. Charles Aznavour plays the timid Edouard, aka Charlie, a piano player in a cheap bar who is really a classical concert pianist hiding from a catastrophic, tragic history. A pretty new waitress knows who he is and encourages him to live again. But as in most American gangster movies, you can't run away from your past. Truffaut includes an amazing amount of philosophy about women, Fate, success, failure, marriage; all couched in a runaway style that is familiar to us today, but must have been shocking and exhilirating back in 1960. (The famous cut to the "old woman dropping dead" could have come directly from MAD magazine.) And who hasn't sometimes felt bedeviled by fortune and shyness: we greatly identify with Charlie. The comically incompetent yet sinister villains are also a great touch. This movie feels as fresh as it must have 40 years ago.

Sometimes the book is just better!
Maybe one shouldn't compare the movie and book versions of a story. But sometimes that's inevetibable. And sometimes the movie actually improves on the book, ie. "In a Lonely Place." However, in the case of "Shoot the Piano Player," based on the book "Down There," by David Goodis, I can't say this is so. The look of the movie has that gritty noir feel, but all the time one feels as if they're watching the characters in a goldfish bowl ? from a great remove. You don't really get to know the characters or their motivations. In the book, this is much more clear and makes for a much more involving experience. Also, the addition of the character Fido (the piano player's younger brother) adds little to the story. In novel and movie we don't really get a great feel for why the waitress does what she does, but in the novel we get more of a feel for it and that does make a difference. It also makes a difference that we know more of the piano player's background, that he served with Merrill's Marauders in World War II, that, after losing his first wife, he went on a binge of anger and hate and fighting that finally led him to be the "docile" person he is when we meet him. This is little explained in the movie. Some of it's there, but much of it isn't and without it the character just seems a cypher. Read the book, watch the movie and decide for yourself.

MR CHARLIE
This luminous little movie contains 2 of the greatest scenes ever put on film. Charlie, a piano player in a seedy Paris bar, has locked away his heart so even he can't get to it. A young woman who works at the same bar is determined to crash through the wall he has constructed around himself. Through her, his painful past is discovered and the promise of the present ends in the disolution of hope. Truffaut is constantly surprising us with the unexpected. There are car chases & kidnappings & excapes and even oaths acted out; and all with an air of the inevitable. There's never been another film like it. The scene where the barmaid takes him home & they sleep together consists of 360 degree pans around the room with cuts of the couple settling into each others' arms as they sleep. It is one of the most poignant & beautiful scenes ever filmed. (The pans with goldfish feeding at the top of their aquarium are expecially touching.) And there is a scene of the hero Charlie, going to his piano audition, that is done with such economy of style that the mixture of clashing feelings comes flooding out. 'Don't shoot the piano player; he's doing the best he can.' Not to be missed.

NOSTALGHIA
At first, just two or three thoughts about the quality of the Fox Lorber DVD. Poor is the word. Subtitles one can not remove, six trailers of Truffaut movies, so so filmographies and that's all. If one considers that the DVD treatment of the images is average at the best, awful during the first five minutes of the movie in a nightly Paris, you will have to be a genuine Truffaut fan to buy this DVD. I am, so I bought it.

Why does I like this movie ? Well, I presume I'm touched by the so praised Truffaut touch for a beginning. But, above all, I always feel an intense nostalgy when I'm watching SHOOT THE PIANO PLAYER. To hear Charles Aznavour play his sad melodies at the piano and the late Boby Lapointe sing "Framboise" move me a lot. To admire once again this fantastic actor Albert Rémy - the father in the 400 BLOWS -, Michèle Mercier before her ANGELIQUE serie, the screenwriter Daniel Boulanger in the role of a comic gangster or the director Alex Joffé as the passerby philosopher is an always renewed pleasure for me.

A DVD zone give it a chance.

I use the word 'emotional' a lot. It means everything to me
Truffaut said he realised, when filming 'Shoot the Pianist', a gangster film, that he hated gangster films. He shows his contempt most by consistently emphasising human truth over generic convention, but finally allowing generic convention to win brutally through. For Truffaut, genre is incompatible with humanity and its messiness.

Like many of my favourite films (and it is my favourite), 'Shoot' is a reworking of 'Vertigo', the story of a man who lets two women die because of his own emotional cowardice, leaving him in emotional shellshock. Aznavour's performance - and this isn't sufficiently realised - is one of the towering achievements of cinema, a complete, physical embodiment of diffidence, guilt, solitude and emotional paralysis, a man more lethal in his dithering passivity than murderous gangsters are in their violence.

Like all the best art, 'Shoot' is a tragicomedy, moving bewilderingly between the two moods, creating a devastating emotional texture - the hilarious scene where Charlie debates the best way to hold Lena only to tragically realise she's gone, or the frightening abduction scene that sees captor and juvenile captive argue comically over scarves.

As the title suggests, music is this film's soul, the only thing that can transcend genre for Charlie, the only way an emotionally dead man can feel.

Truffaut's restlessly inventive mise-en-scene, switching between studied artifice and breathless open air filming, is full of Hitchcock, Godard, Ophuls, Ray, Renoir - all the best of cinema; but in truth, there is no other film like it. ... Read more

Amazon.com

François Truffaut again tackles the elusive nature of creativityand the elusive creation in this thoughtful, sumptuous, 1980 film.Nominated for the Best Foreign Language film Oscar, and a winner of various Césars,The Last Metro is a tale of the theater in occupied France during World War II.Marion Steiner (Catherine Deneuve) manages the Theatre Montmarte in the stead of her Jewish husband, director Lucas Steiner (Heinz Bennent).He has purportedly fled Francebut is really hiding out in the basement of the theater.The one hope to save the Montmarte is a new play starring the dashing Bernard Granger (Gérard Depardieu).The attraction between Marion and Bernard is palpable, and as usual Truffaut creates tension and drama from even the most casual of occurrences.The theme of the director locked away while his lover and his creation are appropriated by others makes for interesting Truffaut study, but first and foremost this is a well-spun romance.--Keith Simanton ... Read more

Reviews (9)

Truffault can be a lot of fun
Francois Truffault, who has always terrified me as a true "art" director, comes across in this film with warmth and humor; not only that, one get to learn a little about Paris under the Nazis and how people "coped." Catherine Deneuve, wife of the director and lead lady, is gorgeous as she balances the needs of her cranky Jewish husband in hiding (Heinz Bennent; he's continuing to direct by listening in to rehearsals through the pipes) and those of her handsome leading man (Gerard Depardieu), whose only way of coming on seems to be to grasp a pretty woman by the hand, gaze into it and murmur, "I seem to see two women here." For a movie about a sad and terrible time, there is a lot of strength, here, and I found Truffault, for some bizarre reason, easy to understand.

Grace and Elegance
If films were planes, Francois Truffaut's "The Last Metro" would be a glider, cutting gently through the winds of occupied Paris, and moving gracefully through the lives of a theatrical troup attempting to mount a production during wartime. As Marion Steiner, Catherine Deneuve brings elegance and beauty to the subtle intrigue and fluctuating emotions of day-to-day life under Nazi occupation in 1942. Like Truffaut's film, her performance is one of nuance and subtlety, and garnered her the award for best actress in France.

Marion Steiner leads two lives, separated only by a stairway. Below the theatre, in the cellar, she shares a love with her husband Lucas (Heinz Bennet), a Jewish theatrical director who must live in hiding, coming to life only when Marion's footsteps bring her into his claustrophobic world.

Their love is real, but is slowly threatened by the distance and contrast of the living going on up above and the stagnation and frustration below. The internal strain becomes greater when Marion falls under the spell of her leading man, Gerard Depardieu, Truffaut's camera capturing the fleeting glances and icy demeanor that is our window into Marion's heart. Depardieu's passion for French resistance, however, may prove greater than his passion for the theatre, and Marion must also contend with a pro-Nazi theatre critic who could sink the production before it begins.

Only after Truffaut has used his camera to show us this elegantly detailed world of the French theatre during wartime does his screenplay suprise us, and remind us in an uplifting way that life itself is but a play, and we are all part of the cast.

This is definitely a masterpiece, but if you have not ventured into foreign films yet, I would not suggest this be your maiden voyage. One must ride the 747 first to appreciate the grace of Truffaut's glider, turning ever so quietly, without a sound, into the winds of the human heart.

Warning: subtitles cannot be turned off
Zone 1 Francophones beware: the english subtitles are on
the video layer and cannot be turned off. I suppose this
might save the production cost of redoing subtitles for
DVD, but it would be nice if this fact were mentioned in
the technical info. Completely unacceptable, hence the
automatic one-star rating.

A true classic
One of Truffaut's and Deneuve's best pictures. It has warmth, history, a sense of the absurd, excellent pacing, and a bit of suspense. It's also has more a linear storyline then many French films. All of the performances are excellent.
Two Warnings:
1. Avoid dubbed versions (Deneuve's sense of humor is in her voice, not on her face, resulting in a mirthless character when dubbed).
2. The new Fox version changed the sub-titles and wrecked some of the best lines.

Late Truffaut that gets better with every viewing.
Truffaut follows in the tradition of Jean-Pierre Melville by adapting a popular genre as a serious allegory for the darkest period in French history: the Nazi Occupation. Just as Melville used the gangster film to examine notions of legality, legitimacy, authority and criminality in a period when the Resistance were outlaws and the police were rounding up Jews for the death camps, so Truffaut takes the beloved putting-on-a-show warhorse, and uses it as a metaphor for the conditions of life in Occupied France: the need to act, adapt and continually discard roles. When Depardieu's character leaves to fight for the Resistance, he puns about exchanging his make-up (maquillage) for the maquis. What Truffaut is most interested in, as in all his films, is the effect this need for constant dissembling has on individual identity and relationships.

This wonderful romantic comedy plays like a mature update of 'Casablanca', richly stylised, bravely open-ended, with Truffaut's moving camera wrenching spirit from claustrophobic confines. ... Read more

Reviews (8)

Not as good as Jules & Jim, but still worthwhile...
This is the story behind Jules & Jim. It is a fictionalized account of the author who wrote it. So, instead of being one woman for two guys, it is one guy for two girls. Let me say this right off the bat - this is not in the same league as Jules & Jim. The other reviews of this movie which cite it as one of Truffaut's best are overly generous. Even the look of this film cannot compare to J&J, which was shot in timeless, glorious black and white and it still looks just as fresh today. Two English Girls is shot in color, which has faded somewhat and it makes the picture look cheaper.

In his book, The Films in My Life, Truffaut pledges his admiration for Henry Miller. He has a fascination with eroticism and it always troubled him that Miller could be frankly erotic in prose, but on screen it loses something and becomes [more erotic]. This movie is an exercise in testing the boundaries of artistic eroticism. It is a hit and miss affair: sometimes it comes off as a letter to Penthouse Forum and there is a scene which is disturbing to modern sensibilities involving two little girls. However, at its best I do think the film captures some of the awe of physical love that it aspires to.

I hope I don't seem too down on this film. It is still a Truffaut film, which means that it is better than anything you are going to see in theaters now. It's just that he is competing against himself, which is alas, too much competition.

Truffaut's Best Film
Only Truffaut could have made this film. It is very sad, but it has all his charm and tenderness, his very French appreciation of love and happiness, and his literary cast of mind. He said that he liked to make films about "the sentiments". If that was his goal, this was his best film.

A BEAUTIFUL SENSITIVE MOVIE
Arguably the director's best movie,LES DEUX ANGLAISES ET LE CONTINENT is both charming and moving.TRUFFAUT always loved stories about love triangles(his own life was like that).It is not surprizing that he added the scenes that were originally missing when the film was first presented in 1971.He was obviously very fond of that movie.JEAN-PIERRE LÉAUD his alter ego from the DOINEL series was miscast to be sure,but it doesn't diminish the quality of the storytelling.A common TRUFFAUT device here is the use of the voice over that comes off perfectly.Very few films have succeeded in presenting the theme of love in all it's cruelty and physical aspects.MURIEL and ANNE the héroines are reminiscent of the BRONTÉ sisters.A good choice for anyone who wants to understand the psychology of women.

Truffaut's Best
Truffaut made lots of great movies, and lots of mediocre ones. "Two English Girls" stands out, I think, as his best.
Like "Jules and Jim," this film involves a love triangle, only instead of two men and woman, as the title suggests, this triangle is made up of two women (sisters) and a man named Claude (Jean-Pierre Leaud).
Initially, during an extended stay at the girls home in England, Claude falls in love with Muriel (Stacey Tendeter), but after a period of separation, he decides to "play the field." When Muriel's sister Anne (Kika Markham) moves to Paris, Claude begins a relationship with her, only to find that she can play the field too. Eventually, Claude and Muriel come together for one night, and the experience rekindles Claude's love. But it is not to be. I won't spoil the films ending, but will say that it leaves only the most unsentimental viewers without tears in their eyes.
The films sole flaw is a short part in which Muriel confesses to masturbation in a letter. This detracts from what is otherwise a supremely sensitive and touching film.

ANN & MURIEL
One of Truffaut's favorite movies of mine, TWO ENGLISH GIRLS is an adaptation of a novel from Henri-Pierre Roché, the author of "Jules & Jim", a book Truffaut had adapted 10 years before.

Two women, one man and the waltz of the misunderstandings and the hesitations dancing between the walls of a love that doesn't dare to speak. The movie features a romantic love story happening a hundred years too late, so, as always in Truffaut movies, the characters are out of focus, they live a virtual passionate love that could fill hundreds of pages of a novel but are doomed to suffer in the trivial reality of the beginning of the XXth century.

A superb musical score by Georges Delerue and a Jean-Pierre Léaud lunar as usual should tempt you even if the quality of the DVD presented by Fox Lorber is no more than average.

A DVD zone your library. ... Read more

Reviews (12)

Shamelessly Entertaining Neo-Noir Masterpiece
"The Bride Wore Black" is another neo-noir classic from Francois Truffaut. It's adapted from the pulp novel masterpiece by Cornell Woolrich (aka William Irish.) Truffaut retains the story and the sense of doom of the book but pares down Woolrich's convoluted plot so that it is even darker. Jeanne Moreau is scary as the implacable Bride, who tracks down the five men she holds responsible for the death of her husband on their wedding day. (You can see the tremendous influence this film had on Tarantino's "Kill Bill.") This is an icy examination of the eternal war between men and women; the men are either sexual predators or spinless wimps, and the Bride is remorseless in exterminating them. The film has several setpieces that are obviously tributes to Hitchcock (like the high-rise building; and the wrongfully accused teacher.) There's even a musical score by Hitch's signature composer, Bernard Herrman. Truffaut ratchets up the tension to unbearable levels as we wait to see how the Bride will dispatch her next victim. Truffaut, the great humanist and friend of small children, occasionally peeks out, but mostly this film is a gripping ride on the dark side. It also has one of the gratest final scenes I've encountered in a movie. Just terrific.

Truffaut's homage made even Hitch proud.
When THE BRIDE WORE BLACK first came out to theaters Hitchcock went out to see it for himself. He had been good friends with Truffaut already for a while and Truffaut had been an admirer of his for a long time. After Hitch saw it he told Truffaut what he thought. His only thought was that in one of the murder scenes a pillow should have been put under the head of one of the men who was dying. But other than that he gave his seal of approval and so do i. This is one of the best homages to Hitchcock that i have ever seen. The story is adapted from a novel by William Irish and it is about a woman named Julie Kohler (Jeanne Moreau- Jules and Jim, Viva Maria!) who's husband is shot and killed on her wedding day. After living for a long time in deep depression she decides to track down the five men who killed her husband (accidentally) and kill them one by one. She uses her charms to get to them and soon after she kills them. The movie is not unbearably suspenseful but it is potent enough so that you wonder what will happen next. The reason for it not being so suspenseful is that you can guess more or less what will happen but what does keep it suspenseful and interesting is that we don't know how these situations will turn out. Truffaut's direction keeps the movie flowing along at a constant pace and he uses wardrobe to convey how Julie is feeling by having her wear black very often and if she does wear any other color it is only white. Jeanne Moreau gives a subtle and sympathetic performance in a role in which she could have gone over the top but wisely chose not to. We sympathize with her even as she is commiting these horrible crimes because Truffaut has us understand her pain but never fully. The psychological aspect which could have been exlpored more in this movie is never fully explored but it's not unforgiveable since the movie is not really about that. It's more about Julie's experience of trying to get her revenge. The script is solid as well and the movie is accompanied by a beautiful score by Bernard Herrmann who was Hitchcock's frequent collaborator and the score is reminiscent of Hitchcock's VERTIGO and MARNIE. This is very definatley one of the best homages to Hitchcock and also one of the best in Truffaut's legacy of films.

Two Stars For The Score Only
Bernard Hermman's score is magnificent. This was a major let down for me considering it was directed by Truffaut. Lacked any real suspense and edge. Boring camera work for the most part. Some nice editing touches here and there but overall pretty lackluster. The acting was fine...I guess. It was just a pointless story I felt that really didn't go anywhere. And what was with that crummy ending?

A tribute to Hitchcock, Louise Brooks and women's legs!
Master director Francois Truffaut and legendary actress Jeanne Moreau proves in this film a brunette can be more than a match and just as deadly as the most iciest of Hitchcock blondes, with the great Bernard Hermann delivering a turbulent, impending and breathtakingly haunting score which unfortunately is not out on soundtrack. Truffaut also pays tribute in hairstyle form to Louise Brooks, the 20's actress noted for her distinctive hairdo, which Moreau's character sports. This unforgettably haunting story full of symbolism plays out with the grand sweep and scope of almost Greek tragedy-mythic proportions, starring brunette Moreau as femme fatale extraordinaire Julie Kohler, an emotionally insulated and fascinating woman who descends upon her hapless victims like an exquisite bird of prey in larger-than-life vengeful goddess fashion (which we're not really meant to take all that seriously but is very effective)--she is at once meticulous, deliberate, detached and above all else, mesmerizing with her cold impassive beauty and emotionally/sexually untouchable aura. Her motley prey are a colorful assortment consisting of a wealthy playboy, a romantic loser, a smarmy politician, a mute gangster and a skirt-chasing artist. In highly dramatic and effective use of flashback we learn that Julie turns avenging angel when the love of her life is "assassinated" before her on the steps of a grand cathedral right after their wedding ceremony!--granted it's melodramatic and over-the-top but fits right in with the film's tragic gradeur. Throughout Moreau/Julie is dressed entirely in black and white but wears no other color--appropriate since her character sees the world now only in terms of black and white with no shades of gray, for even when learning these are not "bad" men (except perhaps the gangster) and what occurred was a purely hapless accident, there's no turning back in her unwavering resolve and vow to carry out her revenge.

The most fascinating scenes involve artist Fergus (the always excellent Charles Denner) whom Julie leaves cold at first but who soon becomes enthralled by her aloofness and suppressed sexuality, and in turn she shows signs of emotional and sexual awakening with his frank but pleasant personality and under his almost lovemaking/foreplay-like touch and caressess as he poses her--not surprising since obviously no man has gotten close to or touched her since her husband's death years ago, with the strong impression that she may even be a virgin! As the audience we hope Fergus can save Julie from her personal torment so she will find the happiness she so dearly deserves, but unfortunately the tragic past, her haunted memories and steely resolve win out over this new chance at love, life and happiness. Despite the killings she commits with such calculated and efficient dispatch, Julie is a sympathetic character because she's a principled murderess--she's not willing to hurt anyone but her targets or let anybody take the fall for her actions, as the scene dealing with the politician, his son and the son's schoolteacher compellingly displays her humanity. This is a fascinating character study of a troubled and complex female obviously inspired by Hitchcock's earlier "Marnie," but in this case Truffaut goes one step further with his version of an un-savable Marnie. A comment--throughout this film (as well as some of his others) Truffaut reveals what obviously is his leg fetish, as we the audience are subjected to numerous references as well as many voyeuristic and lingering shots of Moreau's legs!

Truffaut and Woolrich--quelle combination!
Based on the novel of the same name, this film is a razor sharp depiction of one woman's relentless pursuit of her newly wedded and deaded husband's killers. Cornell Woolrich was THE quintessential noir fiction writer, the master of savage irony, and this is, without question, one of the best translations of his work into film.

Jeanne Moreau brings out the fanatic dedication of the main character--as schoolteacher, vixen, artist's model--whatever it takes, she will find and destroy the killers. Even in prison, she manages to kill. Her impassive demeanor is a perfect representation of the Woolrich ethos--that life in its unpredictability will change you so dramatically that there is no chance in hell you will ever be the same as you were before.

The killers are all regular guys who never suspect a thing--because they're not professional criminals, they have no reason to be looking over their shoulders. The various methods the Moreau character uses to dispatch the men are clever and intriguing.

Truffaut's sharp eye for character detail is an exact match with Woolrich's mordant eye for plotting. The two together make for a tough, engaging film that still rings true after more than 30 years. ... Read more

Reviews (15)

J'AI FAIM!!!
This is a WONDERFUL, striking movie...I watched in French class several years ago and have always looked back on it fondly. So many of the issues are "shocking" to Americans, and serious issues are treated plainly with humor and wit, instead of the dramatic "dressing up" that they usually recieve on "popular" films. I LOVE THIS MOVIE...

Enjoyable!
I finished this movie today in French class. It is a very good comedy. There is no plot to the movie it is basic scenes of these children who go to a school. I would not buy it but if you find it somewhere you can rent it you defianately should rent it.

The Surviving Child¿
Small Change is a film that describes interactions between different children and their social macrocosm and this leads to different results in their social microcosms, since the children are under the complete control of their guardians. The adults' parenting sometimes leaves the children vulnerable and which is presented in a number of troubling scenes. Despite these perilous situations, the children survive and have to learn how to manage by themselves in order to live a happy life. Nevertheless, the parents do offer affection and love for the children, which aids in their struggle through life. In turn, the children also affect adult rule over them through different actions. Truffaut displays great understanding for children through this film by creating a next to perfect dissection of child development and child psychology that psychologists such as Harlow, Vygotsky and Piaget would call "a functioning experiement in action". Overall, there are several pleasurable moments in the film that are well balanced with the serious occasions, which leaves the audience with a brilliant cinematic experience that is full of wonderful life lessons.

Not really a comedy
I've read all the reviews and they all seem to be missing the REAL point of the movie. Sure, it shows some delightfully comedic vignettes about childhood in France (and well, really the nature of childhood), but all of those funny bits like Geoffrey a fait boum and the police chief's daughter with her megaphone "j'ai faim" stand in stark contrast to the outcast Julien Leclerc (please pardon me if that is not precisely his name, but I am relying on my memory on this), who lives in a run down shack on a street where people just did not live and who was regularly abused by the "unseen enemy" of his family members (which yes, you do see in the end).

In this film we see the contrast of the innocence of childhood shattered by the heartbreak of abuse. This was an era where child abuse was just beginning to be dealt with in the media and we see Truffaut giving us intermittent glimpses of a child on his own, finding it hard to stay awake in class because he was forced out of the house for the night, picking up coins that dropped out of people's pockets at a local carnival, and fearing taking his clothes off for the school physical because of the bruises on his body.

I think we do a great disservice to the film and to Truffaut to call it a comedy. There is so much more to it than that.

gregory went boom!!
oh my gosh i love this movie!! i'm watching it in french class right now and it is the funniest thing ever!! when gregory fell out the window i almost died laughing and when slyvie stood on her porch saying j'ai faim over and over again!! that was hilarious!! i want to buy this soo much and everyone should watch it!! it's the best!! ... Read more

Reviews (5)

Deserves to be Discovered
"The Wild Child" was directed by Francois Truffaut and released in 1970. Truffaut has made some extraordinary movies, such as the Antoine Doinel series and "Jules et Jim." Unfortunately, this movie is given relatively little recognition, even though it truly is first-rate. Based on a true story, the movie concerns Victor, l'enfant sauvage - a boy found in the wilds of France. Truffaut cast himself as Dr. Jean Itard an 18th century physician who helps "tame" and educate the boy. Initially branded an "idiot" and uneducable by local townspeople, Victor is helped immensely by Dr. Itard through his humane treatment.

The story is fascinating and quite gripping. In addition, the movie raises interesting questions regarding "civilized" behavior and ethics, as it compares Victor to various people in the town. Although similar stories has been told elsewhere (e.g., Herzog's "Every Man for Himself"), Truffaut manages to put his own interesting spin on the tale. Further, his direction is masterful, and he won Best Director from the National Board of Review. The film was made in black and white, which adds great realism to the story - it looks terrific (It won Best Cinematography from the National Society of Film Critics). The only debit is the lack of DVD extras.

Boy gone wild!
No-frills, pared-to-the-bone film by Francois Truffaut concerning the true story of a "savage" pubescent who was captured in a forest in France, living like a beast. The story takes place at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, but, rather curiously, Truffaut makes no political commentary about post-Terror France. All in all, this is a rather excellent idea, one to be emulated by other period-piece makers who clog their movies with "historical figures", famous events, or other data that don't have much to do with whatever story they're telling. Here, Truffaut sticks strictly to the point. (A miracle, considering this director's track-record!) Scarcely deviating from the source-material -- a journal by the doctor who took responsibility for the child, domesticated him, and attempted to train him up into a proper little Frenchman -- the director lets the story itself do all the work. The documentary-feel to the the movie brings many interesting themes, one by one, to the surface. Not the least of which is the relativism of "happiness". Bored of the endless lessons ("match this shape with this object", etc.), the boy runs off only to discover the forest has been spoiled for him forever by the doting doctor and his maid, by the delicious food, by the comfortable sleeping quarters, by the glasses of water and milk, and so on. He returns home willingly, but his face, upon hearing the doctor say, "Tomorrow, we resume our lessons," says it all. (This movie makes a thematic companion-piece to Nicolas Roeg's pessimistic *Walkabout*.) Also of note is that Truffaut reverts to black & white in this film (it was made in 1970), perhaps because he was concerned that the soft, lovely colors of the French countryside would encourage sentimentality. Indeed: the rather grim B&W photography, the clinical approach to the material, the serious implications underlying the story, and even his own wooden performance as the doctor, all combine to shoo away happy-ending seekers.

Truffau's Tarzan Movie
Before getting this DVD I'd only seen this film once before on TV sometime in the late 1970's. It was refreshing to see it once again particularly the prestine black and white form in which it is presented here.

The plot concerns the effort of a doctor, played by Truffaut himself, to educate a feral child that has been found in a forrest in a remote part of France. The story is told mainly through voice-over from a journal that we occasionally see Truffau writing and is supposedly based on true events that took place in the ninteenth centuary.

It is a beautifully observed film with understated and realistic performances from everyone involved in particular Jean-Pierre Cargol in the title roll as the boy who has lived in the forrest and become detached from society.

The strange thing about this film is it looks a lot older than it's 1969 production date and it is also strange that after two colour films Truffau went back to monochrome for this movie.

Truffau's doctor seems to be torn between emotional involvment with the child he eventually calls "Victor" and regarding his charge as a sociological experiment and that dilemma is at the heart of the film and is never really resolved even though his treatment of victor sometimes seems to owe more to Dr. Benjamin Spok than to ninteenth centuary child care techniques. Also when Victor is first examined by the doctor he comes to the conclusion that someone has at sometime tried to cut his throat but the doctor never tries to find out the identity of the attempted murderer or indeed the true identity of Victor himself. These aren't realy criticisms of the film so much as observations on how the film is presented although one thing that I would have welcomed would have been to have the voice- over in English as it is in the English versions of some of his other films; I find that having to read subtitles for both the dialoge and the voice-over is sometimes a bit waring and detracts from the excellent photography in this film.

In conclusion I feel this wonderful film is a neglected classic and I'm suprised that Hollywood hasn't remade it as it is such a great story.

Underrated Truffaut
There may be another Francois Truffaut film about a boy coping with traumatic surroundings - 1959's "The 400 Blows" - which is far better known (and arguably his greatest), but an equally personal, affecting work is the film made 10 years later, "The Wild Child". Based on a true case of the late 1700's, it examines a doctor's attempts to educate a 10 year old mute boy found living among the elements in a French forest. Having been abandoned by his parents since infancy, the child must learn to adapt to civilized society and, through his efforts, forms a bond with the caring doctor. The film's fittingly archaic tone is actualized by the grainy black and white photography. Truffaut (in one of his few starring film roles) is natural as the resolute doctor; his earnest curiosity is appealing. Jean-Pierre Cargol, in the titular part, is particularly impressive; In what superficially appears to be a simple role (maladroit, non-human movements, dialogue basically limited to high-pitched grunts), his unmannered presence imbues the film with a near-documentarian authenticity. Another gratifying personal film from a leading director of the French New Wave.

The Wild Child is spellbinding from beginning to end.
Please see this movie. I loved it and so will you ... Read more

Description

Gérard Depardieu and Fanny Ardant star as former lovers who find themselves unintentionally reunited seven years later as neighbors in a small French village who rekindle their ill-fated relationship. ... Read more

Reviews (5)

Not one of Truffaut's best
If the movie was not directed by Francois Truffaut, who would say it's a masterpiece? To me, this movie is far less attractive than Jules et Jim and 400 Blows. The movie centres on a love affair between a married husband (Gerard Depardieu) and a married wife (Fanny Ardant) who happened to be lovers in the past. One day, they became neighbours and the sparkle of love was reignited. Truffaut liked to play with relationships in his movies. He posed the question "Who is your true love?" and "How if you react if your heart betrays you?" onto the chracters, and we can see the bewilderment in the first half of the movie. However, the movie starts to collapse when Adrant was put into a mental institution as no signs of her madness was mentioned or even noticed in the movie. And the later tragedy was already predicted when a dog was smelling a bag in a restaurant when the couple met the tennis club owner. The signs of suspense were unnaturally put to hint the audience. The death in the end falls in the cliche of ending a dead knot of love. To compare this movie, I would say Wong Kar-wai's In the mood of Love is on a much higher level on dealing with love affairs.

The making of a diva
Ardant and Depardieu look younger in this film, although age has not hurt Fanny Ardant, has made her even more beautiful (see 8 Femmes). This movie is about 20 years old so this was France at the time of Truffaut. This was the first movie of Fanny Ardant directed by Francois Truffaut. She is beautiful in this movie, in fact Truffaut eventually married her and they had a daughter.

Gerard Depardieu and Fanny Ardant are former lovers who are reunited unintentionally after several years, as neighbors in a small village (think small ' none of Paris - with proverbial French dogs, yes, the canine variety, one is inside a restaurant with diners!) They are married to different people who both seem very nice, one would think the past is behind the two former lovers, but this is a Truffaut movie, it cannot be mundane or even predictable nor be a soap opera. While the movie will not push you on the edge of your seat, Truffaut is a master in exploiting the senses and emotions. The interactions of the former lovers gives you a glimpse of the nature of their past relationship. It was not an ordinary affair. Ardant and Depardieu rekindle their affair and the emotional roller coaster starts. There are deep psychological scars that now create new wounds with the rekindling of the relationship. The movie is sensuous, funny, lighthearted, disturbing then dark and sad. The end is very surprising.

The DVD features trailers from Truffaut's other films including 400 Blows and the Wild Child.

All You Need is
Depardieu and Ardant are paired in this movie, and not for the last time, and produce a grotesque story of obsession between former and now reunited lovers. Ardant's character is married, and her older, boring husband is beginning to suspect that she has feelings for another man.

If you conclude from this movie that the French are so much in love with being in love that they are not outraged even when love kills, I won't argue with you. "The Woman Next Door" is about forbidden love and fatal attraction. It is a movie about two people who are lost in the world without love, but who cannot love in this world.

One of Truffaut's Finest
This is a film which epitomizes not only Francois Truffaut's recurrent themes - obsessive love, an ordinary man's cognizant self-destruction - but also his style of understatement, which, as a personal favorite of mine, is closer to the experience of real life than that of any other filmmaker. When one witnesses a supreme disaster, what does one notice? Not the kind of coverage of events such as many "hot" American directors today think is powerful - dozens of shots that show the same action over and over again in closeup, medium shot, full shot, tracking shot, crane shot, computer FX shot, you-name-it shot; but instead from the point of view of ONE person who is intimately involved - who may miss half of the action, yet agonizingly fills in what he missed with what he imagines. This is the genius of Truffaut, who represents this admirable Gallic trait perhaps as much as any other French artist of the twentieth century. The acting of the principals Ardant and Depardieu is perfection, and the story is one of relentless emotional buildup, leading to a shattering denoument.

Magnifique !
Le film de ma vie. Merci ... Read more