François Truffaut - Baisers volés (1968)

After having being discharged from the army for lapses of discipline, a 20-year old Antoine Doinel seems ill-equipped to cope with civilian life. He first gets a job as a night watchman in a hotel, but is soon given the sack. He is then recruited as a private detective by an agency, his first assignment being to trail a magician with a secret love life. Having bungled that case, Antoine is assigned to a shoe-shop at the request of its owner, Monsieur Tabard, who is paranoid that everyone hates him, including his wife. So preoccupied is he with his job that Antoine has little time for his girlfriend, Christine. Things come to a head when Antoine discovers he is also falling in love with Madame Tabard. And who is the myserious stranger who is trailing Christine...?

Antoine Doinel acaba de ser expulsado del ejército. El primer día como civil va a visitar a su ex-novia Christine para comprobar si sigue o no enamorado de ella, pero no la encuentra. El siguiente problema a resolver es el económico, que se resuelve al encontrar un trabajo como portero de noche en un hotel. Un detective privado, el señor Henri, se aprovecha de su inexperiencia para hacer que abra la puerta de una habitación y pillar "in fraganti" a la esposa de uno de sus clientes. Se arma un gran escándalo en el hotel y, como consecuencia, Antoine pierde el empleo. Henri se compadece del muchacho y lo coloca en su agencia de detectives, enseñándole todos los trucos de la profesión.



Six years after Antoine Doinel appeared in the Antoine et Colette segment of the compendium film L’Amour à vingt ans, François Truffaut felt the time was right to resurrect his famous alter ego, who first saw the light of day in Les Quatre cents coups. By this time, Jean-Pierre Léaud, the young actor who played Antoine in these two earlier films, had established himself as an actor in France, most notably for his appearance in Jean-Luc Godard’s film La Chinoise. By the time Baisers volés was made, Léaud had developed his own personality – a mixture of unpredictable rebel, loveable good-for-nothing and womanising scamp – which was perfectly in tune with Truffaut’s vision of the Doinel character. In Baisers volés, Truffaut continues to use Doinel to relate incidents from his own life, most notably his terrible experiences in the army. In 1951, after having absconded without leave, a 19 year old François Truffaut was arrested for desertion. He spent several gruelling months in a German prison before being offered a dishonourable discharge.




In stark contrast to the elegiac poignancy of Les Quatres cents coups and the emotional intensity of Jules et Jim, Baisers volés is a much lighter film, a sentimental romantic comedy about a young man finding his feet (and constantly tripping up) in an adult world. The film’s title comes from a line in Charles Trenet’s song Que reste-il de nos amours? which is also used as the film’s signature tune. This is a film which also manages to capture the mood of the time it was made. The year 1968 has a special significance in the recent history of France. The student demonstrations and general strikes that year shook the de Gaulle government to its foundations and resulted in a burgeoning youth culture. Although Truffaut sympathised with these events, he never directly reflected them in his films, unlike his contemporaries. Despite that, there is an air of quiet subversion which runs through Baisers volés (and indeed the subsequent two Doinel films).




One major political event which marked Truffaut at the time he was making this film was the decision by the French government to remove Henri Langlois from his post as director of the Cinémathèque Française. Truffaut leant his support to the outcry from well-known actors and directors to have Langlois re-instated, and this meant he had less time than he planned to direct this film. Truffaut dedicated Baisers volés to Langlois, and indeed the opening shot takes us right up to the doors of the Musée du cinéma in Paris, appropriately closed for business. Truffaut believed that Baisers volés would fail at the box office because of the distraction caused by the Langlois affair. He was wrong. This proved to be his most successful film in France since Les Quatre cents coups, and it was a surprising success in the United States.



My rip with MeGUI from the Criterion DVD posted by CerealRipper here at Avax

Antoine Doinel es expulsado del Servicio Militar. Inmediatamente toma el oficio de Cuartelero. Por una torpeza suya, es despedido y se convierte ahora en agente secreto de un grupo de detectives. A la vez de tener este nuevo oficio comparte su tiempo con Christine, una amiga suya. Con ella tienen una relación que no se sabe si son amigos cariñosos o son medio enamoraditos. Da la sensación que ella estuviera enamorada de él más que él de ella. Lo importante es que en el fondo ambos se gustan. Christine es una mujer cariñosa. Antoine es un tipo original, ni muy menso ni muy genio. Antoine Tiene ese tick nervioson y ese floro locuaz que atrae a las féminas. Por esas cosas de su trabajo detectivesco lo ponen como agente encubierto en una zapatería. El dueño de la zapatería quiere saber “quien lo detesta en su zapatería”. Por esas cosas de la vida, Antoine se enamora de la esposa del dueño, una vez más una serie de enredos se empiezan a suceder. Nuestro héroe una vez más perderá el trabajo y empezará uno nuevo, esta vez será técnico en reparación de televisores.

La tercera entrega de la historia de Antoine Doinel es la segunda mejor de la saga luego de “El amor en fuga”. Besos Robados porque Antoine le roba un piquito a Christine cuando van por una botella de vino al sótano de la casa de ella. El amor como un proceso es quizá el móvil de esta película, donde tanto Antoine como Christine van descubriendo esta cosilla llamada amor. La canción escogida para la película Que reste t´ill de nos amours pareciera totalmente acorde con los sucesos que transcurren en la película, además de tener una bella melodía.

Script/Guión: François Truffaut & Claude de Givray
Music/Sonido: Antoine Duhamel
Cinematography/Fotografía: Denys Clerval
Cast/Reparto: Jean-Pierre Léaud, Delphine Seyrig, Claude Jade, Michael Lonsdale, Harry-Max, André Falcon, Daniel Ceccaldi, Claire Duhamel, Catherine Lutz, Martine Ferrière, Jacques Rispal, Serge Rousseau, Paul Pavel, François Darbon, Albert Simono