L’amour en fuite, released 20 years after Les quatre cents coups, brings the adventures of Antoine Doinel to an almost happy end. And, as it happens, it brings to the end the Antoine Doinel cycle by Filmoteca Canaria. I guess I would have enjoyed this comedy more if I didn’t see the other parts of the saga. The flashbacks, taken from the previous films, were not exactly necessary and some of them way too long. The torn-up photo story, however, is utterly brilliant.
Is Antoine really a “troubled youth”, “unhappy child” or “outcast”? I didn’t have such an impression. True, the teacher picks on Antoine, but he doesn’t spare other kids either. Here’s one of the IMDb trivia:
All the young actors who unsuccessfully auditioned for the role of Antoine were used in the classroom scenes.
That’s it: all schoolchildren are like Antoine. And, kids being kids, they enjoy themselves even in the most boring and oppressive environments — or find ways out. A gym class scene is simply perfect.
My father and Jean-Pierre both knew this was a very important scene and they had a long time to prepare for it. My father just gave him the questions he was to be asked but then told him to come up more or less with his own answers. That worked beautifully.
Truffaut’s first film in colour, Fahrenheit 451, based on Ray Bradbury’s dystopic novel of the same name, was not exactly appreciated by critics. I wonder why. Didn’t they like the futuristic (by now, retrofuturistic) fire engine which could only work because it’s red? So cool.
This is the second movie I’ve seen in Filmoteca de Cantabria. Starring Oskar Werner as Guy Montag, Julie Christie in the dual roles of Linda Montag and Clarisse, and Cyril Cusack as Captain Beatty.
