The 400 Blows

Truffaut's first full-length film, The 400 Blows, immediately established him at the age of twenty-seven as one of Europe's foremost directors. His story, said to be largely autobiographical, concerns the revolt of a twelve-year-old Parisian schoolboy against unfeeling parents and a dull school, his passage into delinquency, and his escape from confinement into a perilous freedom. Borrowing techniques from documentary realism, Truffaut managed to create a film of strong and steady emotion, without the slightest trace of sentimentality.


This volume contains an accurate reconstitution of the film (including the eight minutes added by Truffaut in 1968), a number of critical pieces, and over 100 frame enlargements carefully keyed to the text.