"New Wave" French young director Francois Truffaut's "The 400 blows" (the title is an idiom meaning "raising hell'') is one of the most intensely touching stories ever made about a young adolescent. Inspired by Truffaut's own early life, it shows a resourceful boy growing up in Paris and apparently dashing headlong into a life of crime.
It is said that this film, which M. Truffaut has written, directed and produced, is autobiographical. That may well explain the feeling of intimate occurrence that is packed into all its candid scenes. The movie centers on the troubled childhood of a young boy named Antoine Doinel. Adults see him as a troublemaker. We follow him as he lies, steals, plays hookie, and gets into every kind of trouble imaginable. But we also see his tender side.
The film's famous final shot, a zoom in to a freeze frame, shows him looking directly into the camera. He has just run away from a house of detention, and is on the beach, caught between land and water, between past and future. It is the first time he has seen the sea.
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