François Truffaut

Filmmakers

François Truffaut (February 6, 1932 – October 21, 1984) was a French film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film critic. He is widely regarded as one of the founders of the French New Wave (which also included Claude Chabrol, Jacques Demy, Jean-Luc Godard, Louis Malle, Chris Marker, Jean-Pierre Melville, Alain Resnais, Jacques Rivette, Éric Rhomer, and Agnès Varda). In a film career lasting over a quarter of a century, he remains an icon of the French film industry, having worked on over 25 films. Truffaut’s film The 400 Blows came to be a defining film of the French New Wave movement, and was followed by four sequels, Antoine et Colette, Stolen Kisses, Bed and Board, and Love on the Run, between 1958 and 1979.

Truffaut’s 1973 film Day for Night earned him critical acclaim and several accolades, including the BAFTA Award for Best Film and the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. His other notable films include Shoot the Piano Player (1960), Jules and Jim (1961), The Soft Skin (1964), The Wild Child (1970), Two English Girls (1971), The Last Metro (1980), and The Woman Next Door (1981). He also had a prominent Supporting role in Steven Spielberg‘s Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977).

Each new review will be linked to the title below.

(*seen originally in theaters)

(**seen rereleased in theaters)

Writer/Director

  • A Visit (1955) – short
  • The Mischief Makers (1957) – short
  • The 400 Blows (1959)
  • Shoot the Piano Player (1960)
  • The Army Game (1960) – co-director
  • A Story of Water (1961) – co-directed with Jean-Luc Godard – short – made in 1958
  • Jules and Jim (1962)
  • Love at Twenty (1962) – directed with Andrzej Wajda, Renzo Rossellini, Shintarō Ishihara, & Marcel Ophüls – anthology
  • The 4 Punches (1962) – actor – short
  • Take It All (1963) – uncredited actor
  • The Soft Skin (1964)
  • Fahrenheit 451 (1966)
  • The Bride Wore Black (1968)
  • Stolen Kisses (1968)
  • Mississippi Mermaid (1969)
  • The Wild Child (1970) – actor
  • Bed & Board (1970)
  • Two English Girls (1971)
  • A Gorgeous Girl Like Me (1972)
  • Day For Night (1973) – actor
  • The Story of Adele H (1975)
  • Small Change (1976)
  • The Man Who Loved Women (1977)
  • The Green Room (1978) – actor
  • Love on the Run (1979)
  • The Last Metro (1980)
  • The Woman Next Door (1981)
  • Confidentially Yours (1983)

Other Credits

  • Fool’s Mate (1956) – uncredited actor – short
  • The Sonata in Kreutzer (1956) – short, actor
  • The Overworked (1958) – co-writer – short
  • It Means That Much to Me (1961) – uncredited writer
  • A Swelled Head (1962) – dialogue
  • Mata Hari, agent H21 (1964) – co-writer
  • Breathless (1966) – co-story
  • Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)** – directed by Steven Spielberg – actor
  • The Little Thief (1988) – co-writer
  • Belle Époque (1995) – miniseries, co-writer