Antoine et Colette (1962)
Directed by François Truffaut

Film Review

Shortly after completing work on Jules et Jim (1962), director François Truffaut was commissioned by the producer Pierre Roustang to contribute a short film segment to his anthology L'Amour à vingt ans.  Four other internationally renowned directors - Marcel Ophüls, Shintaro Ishihara, Andrzej Wajda and Renzo Rossellini - were also invited to participate in the film, which was concerned with the theme of first love.  The film proved to be a commercial disaster and was withdrawn when it failed to have any impact at the box office.  Truffaut was himself unhappy with the film in its entirety.

Whilst L'Amour à vingt ans has fallen into obscurity, Truffaut's contribution to the film, Antoine et Colette, has survived as a short film in its own right.  The film is available on DVD and is often screened at small cinemas and film clubs.  The film's survival and enduring popularity stems from its important placing in the Truffaut canon.  It represents Truffaut's first attempt to re-use the character Antoine Doinel, which he created in his earlier, semi-autobiographical film, Les 400 coups (1959) and then resurrected for his comedy Baisers volés (1968).

Jean-Pierre Léaud, Truffaut's friend and protégé, reprised the role of Doinel, now in his late teens.  His co-star is Marie-France Pisier, a talented actress who would become popular and much sought after by film directors in subsequent years. As in the earlier Doinel instalment, Antoine et Colette is a closely auto-biographical account of an incident in Truffaut's own life, specifically one of his ill-fated love affairs when he was a young man.   It is a poignant yet light-hearted short film, in which Truffaut allowed his actors to improvise to create a sense of spontaneity and realism.  Truffaut re-used much of this film in his final Doinel film, L'Amour en fuite in 1979.

Film Synopsis

Antoine Doinel is 17 years old and works in a factory that manufactures records.  In his leisure time, he listens to classical music and keeps up his friendship with his boyhood chum René.  Whilst attending a recital of music by Berlioz he notices an attractive young girl of his own age, Colette, and realises that he is in love for the first time.  Colette has the kind of supportive family that Antoine never had and it pleases him when they take a liking to him and accept him as one of their household.  Convinced that he has found his one true love, Antoine takes a flat in the street across from Colette, but it gradually dawns on him that she is less romantically interested in him than he is in her.  Colette's parents come to regard Antoine as the ideal son-in-law, but their daughter has other ideas...