Sunday, July 4, 2021

More Movies (Truffaut)

I'm probably forgetting a couple, but I watched The Lady from Shanghai and Tati's Trafic with my son.*  That takes us through the Criterion Tati Blu-ray set.

I just started in on the Antoine Doinel set (apparently out of print, though not too hard to find used), which has four full length films and the Antoine and Collete short and lots and lots of extras.  (This is the type of thing I've been hoarding for ages and am just now starting to watch!)


My instincts were that he wouldn't like The 400 Blows, as it is far too depressing, and that Stolen Kisses sounded the most amusing and probably was the best stand-alone film.  I think I was probably correct, though if he ever becomes a film buff, he can watch the others.  I'll try to get through the later films on my own, as they are about crumbling marriages and certainly aren't as carefree.

While there were some interesting moments in The 400 Blows, esp. when seeing Antoine's mother and step-father interact, I basically have no stomach for films that makes heroes of truants and "bad students" in general.**  To this day, I have trouble appreciating Ferris Bueller...

We both watched Shoot the Piano Player, which I thought was pretty good.

I watched Day for Night by myself, which I think may be my favourite Truffaut film, though Stolen Kisses was pretty close.  Looking over the rest of the movies in my collection, after the remaining two Doinel films, I'll circle back to Jules and Jim, and then The Soft Skin and The Man Who Loved Women.  When I get to The Last Metro, I'll see if my son wants to watch that.


* Also, we saw The Sweet Smell of Success.  The first time ever for me!  A cookie full of arsenic, indeed.

** While I generally like R.K. Narayan's novels a lot, I strongly disliked his first novel, Swami and Friends, as Swami skips class as much as possible.  Fortunately, I pressed on with the others.

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