Funfairs, truancy and typewriters: it's time to discuss a bonafide classic, Francois Truffaut's The 400 Blows. Joining me for this conversation is Tara Creme, a film composer whose previous credits include documentaries Seahorse and March for Dignity. Tara’ brings her personal journey into cinema to this discussion, making for a fascinating conversation.

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indietrix film reviews is a movie review channel hosted by Will Webb with a wide view of cinema, taking in arthouse, indie and blockbuster movies with lots of analysis and discussion.

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Transcript:

00:00:02:01 - 00:00:12:27
Will
Hi. I'm Will Webb, and this is why you should watch. In this episode, we're discussing Francois Truffaut's 1959 film, The 400 Blows.

00:00:14:23 - 00:00:16:23
Tara

00:00:17:06 - 00:00:40:29
Will
In this classic coming of age film, young Antoine bunks off school and runs around Paris, returning home to a chaotic domestic situation that he yearns to escape. Joining me for this conversation is Tara Creme, a film composer whose previous credits include documentaries Seahorse and March for Dignity. Tara brings her personal journey into cinema to this discussion, making for a fascinating conversation.

00:00:42:00 - 00:00:42:28
Will
Hi, Tara. How you doing?

00:00:43:14 - 00:00:44:29
Tara
Hi. I'm well, thanks. How are you?

00:00:45:17 - 00:01:12:19
Will
So well. And the thing I left out about that, about you there in that plotted intro is that we've actually worked together on a project as well, which is how I know you so, me and Tara did something I think that's probably quite different to a lot of the rest of your work. A Very like a dodgy is like kind of sampling leads electronic music for a fake BBC magazine show for a short film last year, which was a very fun project and very different for me too, I should say.

00:01:12:21 - 00:01:33:09
Will
We're talking today about like an absolute all time classic movie, much more so than some of the other stuff that we featured here. But it's great to touch on this, these real classic stuff, which is Lazy 59 Francois Truffaut's The 400 Blows, which I'm reliably informed is actually a really badly translated title. It's not so much as these like hits this kid gets in French.

00:01:33:09 - 00:01:54:09
Will
I think the title means more something like the 400 tricks, the tricks that are played on him, I guess. So we've got this kind of classic to talk about, and it's actually one that I had never watched. I knew very little about going in. Despite all the movies I've seen. Somehow I've managed to leave this off the list, and it'd be great to kick off by talking about how you came to the movie and kind of.

00:01:55:02 - 00:01:59:20
Will
Was it a recommendation for you? Was it one of those like thousand one films to watch before you die type things?

00:02:00:12 - 00:02:28:11
Tara
No, I was really lucky. I had I did French A-level when I was young. And it wasn't going very well. My French, I loved it was hard. It was really hard. We did. We had. But it improved when along with learning about the road system and the wine of Burgundy, we learn films of Truffaut. And it was just this fantastic syllabus which totally turned me on to film.

00:02:28:25 - 00:02:54:00
Tara
And we so I think what we've got to do is we've got to watch the films. All of his films, pretty much in with subtitles and then wrote about it in French. And there were themes like I remember the, the sort of exam themes were things like the role of children and the films of truth or the role of women in the films and Truffaut, things like that.

00:02:54:14 - 00:03:34:25
Tara
And I, I don't actually remember that it was just part of the syllabus, so we would have watched that. And yeah, totally. It saved my French A-level because I suddenly suddenly loved French and kind of studied French really through French cinema. And I used to it just completely turned me on to film and I used to go the used to be the everyman cinema in Hampstead before it got old Posh used to be this kind of rundown, lovely little repertory cinema, and you used to be able to go there and have a cup of coffee and a piece of cake and watch double and triple bills.

00:03:34:25 - 00:03:41:22
Tara
French On a monday afternoon. I don't know. I'm not sure if I was at school or if I had the afternoon off. So but it was very.

00:03:41:23 - 00:03:43:15
Will
Moving and talking with friends did.

00:03:43:16 - 00:03:53:12
Tara
Yes, I was travelling and so on. Whether it's when I was going over there to watch. Yeah, double and triple bills. So that's how I got into, that's how I got to watch the film.

00:03:53:15 - 00:04:10:20
Will
A triple bill is a serious bit of film going. I've never done a triple bill. I've done double bills, and I've sometimes played with the idea of going to the Prince Charles Cinema in Leicester Square to see their like five film overnight screenings. But I cannot I don't think I could do that. I mean, I could sit still for as much as I like a long movie.

00:04:10:27 - 00:04:13:06
Will
I think five different movies is too much for me to get it.

00:04:13:12 - 00:04:34:26
Tara
Yeah, I think the triple bills were quite rare thing. Double bills I did often, but I remember once going to the well, there was one in Kings Cross for a scholar. Yeah, this I remember seeing all night there. But yeah, that was kind of mayhem, really. Everyone was just smoking at the back or people falling asleep in the aisles.

00:04:34:26 - 00:04:40:15
Tara
That was. Yeah, I think I kind of went there late or something. It was. It's too much. Five films the night.

00:04:40:15 - 00:04:57:18
Will
The the school is famous for that stuff isn't it. The I remember going to a talk with one of the guys who ran it, Nick Powell, who unfortunately died last year. And he said the worst thing that they had happened there was that one guy just died in the back row during an overnight because it was in an area that was very rundown in London at time.

00:04:57:18 - 00:05:11:12
Will
It was the King's Cross now is like so gentrified, but it was very rundown. And so a lot of homeless people would come in and basically use it as a cheap or even just like they snuck in a free place to sleep. And yes, old guy just died in the back row. So yeah, what a way to go.

00:05:11:14 - 00:05:28:09
Will
And at a real risk for survival of screening anyway. And I think it's lovely that you found this through A-level language. I mean, I'm just thinking about it as like an example of French language. There's so much like kind of playful and jokey colloquialism as well. I can't imagine how that would have been.

00:05:28:25 - 00:05:29:25
Tara
Yeah, that's so true.

00:05:29:25 - 00:05:45:12
Will
Yeah, I noticed that like Anton's stepdad, I thought it was his dad originally watching the film, but apparently his stepdad. Right. He says he gave him his name at some point. And I don't know if there's like something missing in the French individual in it, but I believe he's a stepdad.

00:05:46:00 - 00:05:47:08
Tara
Yeah, his dad.

00:05:48:00 - 00:06:00:20
Will
And he is like this real clown character who, like, has these recurring kind of bits that he's playing. And I'm assuming some of that stuff just goes right over my head as someone who's not a not a French speaker. So, ye...