"Four Hundred Strikes" is a film about growing up, it is the past of you and me, it is the cruel sadness of every teenager. Don't miss out on such a soulful film because of the incomprehensible gray of the title, it's a shame.
"Four White Strikes" (French LES QUATRE CENTS COUPS, English "The Four Hundred Blows"), French slang, which means to beat a disobedient child, can't wait to hit 400 times, so that he can become a good boy. In the film "Four Hundred Blows", director François Truffaut used his own growth story as the prototype to tell the rebellious growth experience and inner world of a "problem youth" 13-year-old boy Antoine Doni. There is no showmanship in the language of the film, only heartbreaking melancholy. Teenagers grow up in cruelty, and neither you nor I have escaped.
The 13-year-old Antoine is a young man with clear eyes and a gentle heart. But his identity as an illegitimate child, the indifference of his mother and stepfather, and the rejection of the school teachers all pushed him to the road of rebellion. First, he was truant with his classmates, but he met his mother and his lover on a date. We can't imagine the pain that this complicated thought has caused to the teenager. Then, Antoine, who had lied, was slapped by his stepfather, ran away from home in a rage, and wandered the streets before dawn. He wanted to steal a bottle of milk that was waiting to be transported away. The satisfaction of the light makes people sigh. The lure and intimidation of the mother's words, and the unreasonable frame of the teacher made Antoine appreciate the darkness of the adult world. When returning the stolen printer, I was caught and sent to the training center. At this time, the sky was still dark. Under the dim street lights, my mother's resolute and cruel eyes made us look cold. Tovan, we are too cold to guard. We saw the silent tears of Antoine on his face, and when confronted with the psychiatrist's questioning, we could see the frail soul of a quiet but scarred teenager. That moment seemed so long, as if it took us back to our own boyhood.
In our growth history, many children may have stolen a little money from the family, were reprimanded and punished by teachers for doing petty actions in class, were exposed by adults for lying, skipped school to play, ran away from home hungry and unbearable, were punished by parents, The embarrassment of adults being slapped in the face •••••• These embarrassing past events in growing up may have been forgotten by adults, but they are still an unforgettable pain in our hearts. In Truffaut's eyes, we see a young man growing up, the beauty is destroyed little by little, the light is dimmed in the slightest, and the cruel reality he bears in his heart is the price everyone has to pay. This price urges us to grow, and the pain can only be endured by ourselves. When Antoine fled from the teaching center and ran to the endless seaside, we did not see the happiness of freedom, only the confusion of the eyes facing the camera. This ending, which has been appreciated and interpreted by countless people, seems to remind us that growing up is a kind of suffering that sinks again and again, and it is also a kind of relief from forgetting and forgetting again and again.
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