Aaron Wolff
Mrs. Kolb
Intro to film
6 April 2026
The New Wave French movement can be attributed to the context of post war France and post
war French Cinema. These paved the way for the making of a new kind of experimental,
individualistic, realistic film dedicated to a rejection of classic cinematic convention. The film,
Truffaut’s The 400 Blows (1959) shows how history not only influenced the theme of the film
but also how history influenced the film’s structure too. The 400 Blows demonstrates many
characteristics typical to New Wave film and shows quintessentially New Wave conventions in
it’s use of camera and open endings.
Post war France faced enormous social and economic transition’s, a large part of these transitions
were made up of rebuilding France itself, France’s transition into modernism was influential and
the influence of America in particular. Young people in the late 1950s clearly had a huge
difference between them and adults. Whether they rejected their parents, their government, or
ideals in general, their hatred and disappointment toward these people and institutions could only
result in rebellion and defiance. Antoine Doinel’s character truly represents young people in
France at this point in time and a restless generation who felt abandoned and misbehaved and
disobedient according to their elders. Antoine Doinel’s character shows us how a young man can
perfectly represent a restless generation, a group who feel alienated and unaccepted by the
society they live in.
This movement of film was created not just due to changes in France as a society but also
because the film magazine Cahiers du Cinema published essays which advocated auteur theory
which states that the director of the film is in fact the author or ‘auteur’ of their film. Truffaut’s
film is a deeply personal account of his own life and shows auteur theory very clearly, it is clear
that the film was made up of his own life, his life made up of fiction.
Perhaps the most crucial of all developments that had influenced the production of the New
Wave film aesthetic was the arrival of portable light weight camera’s and new film/sound
equipment. This new technology enabled the film maker to leave their stagnant studios and bringtheir production out on location and film in the open world. This new aspect is clearly portrayed
in Truffaut’s film which captured the essence of Paris and it’s chaos, it made you feel that you
were right there with the characters. Also present in The 400 Blows is the heavy use of the
camera and hand held camera shots/long takes which mimic documentary films as they are so
realistic and crude, the use of natural lighting adds to the documentary style even further.
The 400 Blows clearly depicts its deviation from the more classic styles of film making in that it
completely abandons continuity editing, narrative progression is much slower and more character
based. The long takes serve to emphasize the characters behavior instead of the progression of
the film and the film’s structure is episodic to depict Antoine’s lack of direction.
The end scene to the 400 Blows which shows Antoine running toward us after escaping the
reformatory must not be seen as the end but as a new start to his journey, and he continues to run
toward us, we feel as if we have only captured a mere part of Antoine’s journey in this freeze
frame and there is still so much more to his story. This frame can be considered his rebellion
against old rules and restrictions within society but is also viewed as criticism of the child being
a problem and one film critic even considered the ending to be ambiguous.
There are even elements which represent issues present within our own society today, schools
can be seen to treat children as a problem to be tackled and parents are barely visible to their
children. Issues like this, which were heavily criticized in French society toward the end of the
1950’s, go on to shape the revolution of May 1968, but the New Wave aesthetic precedes the
revolution itself.
The 400 Blows is not only about the world that a young boy inhabits, it is about a rejection of old
style film making practices known as tradition de quality, that dictates that only film should be
based on classic literature. The 400 Blows completely shirks this and contains intentional
elements of improvisation and amateurism.
To conclude it must be stressed that The 400 Blows is ultimately shaped by post war France. The
changes she encountered culturally and physically gave her the motivation she needed to
progress and create a completely new era in the cinema of films. While it may be considered a
film with a myriad of social issues, it is the radical influences upon the film within Frenchsociety at the time and its’ groundbreaking visual conventions which prove most significant in
this film.