Rating: 
Summary: Someone has to say it...
Review: This is boring garbage. I'd never shell out money to own this movie, classic or not. I've seen plenty of good foreign movies and this is simply not one of them. Just because "the 400 Blows" was one of the pioneers of the French New Wave doesn't make it good. And just because it's a foreign movie doesn't make it good, either. Those of you who love this film and are reading this review are now rolling your eyes. Why read amateur reviews anyway? You've seen the movie. What help could come from it?"Scream" was influential in re-defining a genre just as much as this film was. The similarity? Mediocrity. Though I'll admit I'd take "Scream" over this any day of the week. I can't see this film as thought-provoking, which is unfair on my part, since halfway through the movie I just stopped caring, thus shutting my attention span down. I hate Francois Truffaut with a passion for making this film. I was forced to watch it and by doing so was spoon-fed 2 hours of boredom. By the way, Breathless and Jules et Jim were garbage as well. Art house people seem to get off on realizing the greatness of these types of movies and by doing so decide to look down upon us casual moviegoers as complete mongoloids, which is simply hilarious. Now let me provoke all you snobs out there. I despise Godard and Truffaut. They made silly and pointless movies and passed them off as art. That said, bring on the negative reviews, baby.
Rating: 
Summary: It doesn't blow.
Review: This masterpiece is Truffaut's first feature film, yes. The first New Wave film? Hold your horses there, sonny. You may want to define what you mean by "New Wave". As a couple of other brilliant reviewers below me have indicated, *The 400 Blows* does look rather like "refried Neo-Realism", and the movie is indeed classically constructed. Much more conventional than the exactly contemporaneous movies by Resnais and Godard, *Hiroshima, Mon Amour* and *Breathless*, respectively. Those movies REALLY "broke all the rules", linear narrative especially. But if you mean by "New Wave" an uncompromising, unflinching attempt to simply tell the truth, if you mean the true artist's concern to dispense with cliches and find his own voice, if you mean a feeling of liberation in a movie in which it seems anything can happen next, then *The 400 Blows* fits your bill. At any rate . . . what Americans will never get about this movie is how much it meant to France. Indeed, "Antoine Doniel", the adolescent hero, emerged as a sort of NATIONAL hero, a French Everyman who the French never tired of: Truffaut made 4 more films with Jean-Pierre Leaud in the role of Doniel. (Believe me, we Americans should feel no need to be as tolerant of Doniel's continuing adventures, which degenerate into sit-com buffonery.) The movie's at its best showing Doniel's adventurous truancy in and around a most unromantic Paris: the opening credits use a moving camera to show the Eiffel Tower trying to peep out above row upon row of ugly warehouses and tenements (Paris wouldn't look so ugly again until Godard's *Alphaville*). It's a tough town for a kid -- but no more tough than his home-life, with his alternately hateful and bribing and flirtatious mother, and his utterly undistinguished, stupid stepfather. It's no tougher than the school, either: Truffaut makes a good case for truancy being more affirmative than attending French public schools. (The teacher is a meanie straight out of Dickens.) The last sequences in which Doniel has been unceremoniously dumped into reform school might be accused of being heavy-handed, but Truffaut makes his points quickly with these scenes -- they by no means turn the film into grim melodrama. All in all, this director must be recognized as being one of the very few artists -- in ANY medium -- who gave a damn about children, and who intelligently told their stories. His *The Wild Child* in particular, made a decade later, seems almost perfect to me, even superior to this movie. [The DVD by Fox-Lorber is pretty good . . . for them. I'm sure the Criterion edition looks better, but it's now out of print, and I'm sure it's not SO MUCH better that it's worth forking out an extra Jackson (or two) for it. I do wish the picture on this Fox-Lorber edition was less dark. The features included a commentary track that probably isn't necessary, talent bios, and a whole slew of Truffaut trailers.]
Rating: 
Summary: Sympathetic and engaging
Review: An idiomatic translation of the French title of this movie, Les quatre cents coup, would be something like "Raising Hell," understood ironically. Twelve-year-old Antoine Doinel, played very winningly by Jean-Pierre Leaud, doesn't suffer "400 blows," although he does get mistreated quite a bit, and he doesn't mean to raise hell or to be a problem to his parents or society. He's just a boy being a boy. Unfortunately his mother (Claire Mauier), who is more like a wicked step-mother than the boy's biological mother (although she is that) would like to be rid of him so that she can spend more time pursuing her hobby, which is adultery. His cuckolded step-father (Albert Remy) is no help, although he seems to care more for the boy than his mother. And the institutions of society, as represented by his school, the Parisian police, and the social services people, seem intent on turning poor Antoine into a criminal. Truffaut ends the movie at a spot where it is still far from clear where Antoine is really headed, but we can guess that his spirit will be undaunted. Some have called this, Francois Truffaut's first feature, realism, but if it's realism, so is Charles Dickens. This is an extended slice of life, a coming-of-ager stopped before the boy does become of age, and in this sense original. Truffaut paints everybody but the boy and his best friend in such a negative hue that we cannot help but identify with Antoine. This is not realism, but it doesn't matter because this is a splendid film, perhaps not as great as some have claimed, but very much worth watching because of Leaud's fine performance and Truffaut's original and charming presentation of Paris in the 1950s. In one sense Truffaut makes the City of Light a child's playground, and in another, it is a repressive, indifferent monolith. Antoine's transgressions--ditching school, telling lies, stealing from his grandmother--are trivial. But Truffaut wants to make sure we don't misunderstand so he has the boy get into trouble for (1) having a magazine passed to him in class, (2) unconsciously memorizing Balzac (he is accused of plagiarism by his fascist teacher) (3) returning a typewriter, which admittedly he had lifted, and (4) lighting a candle in honor of Balzac (which starts a fire). My favorite scene is the one with the psychiatrist in which we hear her questions, but the camera stays on Antoine. His candid, eminently reasonable and entirely sane answers to her questions demonstrate that he is a completely normal, even admirable boy, and that it is society and its stupid adults that are off the mark. The faces of the children at the Punch and Judy show are wonderful and the sequence of Antoine running and running so gracefully and seemingly with little effort symbolizes the longing that all children have to be free. While I think this famous movie is perhaps a little over-rated, I can tell you that if you haven't seen it you are in danger of being labeled a cinematic illiterate.
Rating:
Summary: 5 for the film, 1 for the transfer. Get the Criterion DVD
Review: A great film ruined by awful Fox-Lorber treatment. We can only hope that they will transfer the rights back to Criterion to let them again release a version worthy of Truffaut's coming of age story. It would be nice if F/L would also give up the rights to some of their Godard catalog also. I rented one of their titles and the picture was jumping up and down so much it was how it must be to watch tv during an earthquake.
Rating:
Summary: Great movie, so-so digital transfer
Review: I've been wanting to see this movie for a long time. Last week I finally just forgot about renting any other movie, though I almost took home another great movie. Back on the subject. The movie is great. I never knew what was going to happen next. So many movies today are done by the paint by numbers system of film making... so predictable. The 400 Blows is never predictable, it's fresh till the last second. My only problem with this DVD was the quality of the picture. I can forgive so-so audio quality, but when I see digital remnants all over the picture I wonder what kind of transfer was done. I've seen other movies that are older than this, and their digital transfers are so incredible that they give the film a new life. The quality of the picture only bothered me a couple of times, but I overlooked it because the movie is unique, smart and never boring. If your a film lover you have to see this movie. No, it's not going to blow you away with special effects, but it will blow you away.
Rating:
Summary: The Best
Review: this is the best film i have ever seen bar none nothing compares
Rating:
Summary: A superb DVD of this early classic of the French New Wave.
Review: I think that there is little I can add to the praise of this film offered by other reviewers, but I respectfully would like to present a dissenting opinion about the DVD tranfer, about which some people have complained. I would be the first person to criticize Fox Lorber regarding their lackluster committment to quality. This is deplorable, considering the abundance of classic foreign films to which they own the rights. The rights to the 400 Blows were previously owned by Criterion, which as always, engineered an outstanding transfer of this film. While the blacks and whites of the Fox Lorber transfer are perhaps not quite as luminous as in the Criterion one, I do not think that the distortions in the audio or video should be blamed on Fox Lorber. I saw a newly created print of this film in the theater a couple of years ago, and remember encountering similar defects. Given this film's age, however, the video and audio quality is well above average. The complete resotoration of a film, while very satisfying, is also costly and time-consuming, and I think Fox Lorber has done a commendable job here with their digitally remastered transfer. Now, if only the same could be said about several of their Godard and Rohmer issues! This DVD is well worth adding to your library.
Rating:
Summary: My favorite movie of all time.
Review: "The 400 Blows" (or "Les Quatre Cents Coups") is the story of a young going on through life his way, only having an adult world and incompetent parents to get in his way. In this film we get to see some very personal moments in Antoine, such as the reform school headshrinker appointment, and when he accidentally lights a little shrine honoring Balzac in his room. The ending sequence and frozen zoom all the way at the end will forever live on me.
Rating:
Summary: My favorite move
Review: The first time I saw this movie, as a sophmore in college, I was mesmerized. The wondrous way Truffaut moved the camera! The heartbreaking story of a boy who's neglected, hardened, and turned into a delinquent. The film is also an indictment of parental and other authorities. I've seen the movie over a dozen times, and have found new insights each time. This film will appeal to anyone with aesthetic sensibilities--writers (like me), painters, would-be filmmakers, musicians, whatever. It's simply the best film I've ever seen--far better than Citizen Kane. This is a film to be studied, and enjoyed again and again for its savage beauty.
Rating:
Summary: A Masterpiece
Review: What can I possibly say about this movie that no one else has already said. I once wrote a paper on it and got a C, so I doubt that I can really extract any new thoughts or observations from it. It is the key movie of the French New Wave and if you have an intense love for cinema you've probably already seen it. Those of you who are young and looking towards movies as inspiration, such as I was, watch this movie. It will expand your horizons.
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