50 Fun Facts About François Truffaut

Truffaut is regarded as one of the founders of which film movement?

Historian Tony Judt called him 'not only the main theorist behind the revolution in French cinema' but 'by far its most consistently successful practitioner'.

What was Truffaut's 1959 directorial debut?

He made it after seeing Orson Welles's Touch of Evil at Expo 58, and it drew 4.1 million admissions in France.

Which actor played Truffaut's alter ego Antoine Doinel in five films over twenty years?

He was 14 when he answered a flyer for the audition, and the two were sometimes mistaken for each other in the street.

For which magazine did Truffaut write his notoriously brutal reviews as a young critic?

He was nicknamed 'The Gravedigger of French Cinema' and was the only French critic not invited to Cannes in 1958.

Which critic became Truffaut's mentor, got him out of military prison and found him a job at his new magazine?

Truffaut had joined the army at 18 and spent two years trying to escape it, ending up jailed for attempted desertion.

Which idea, holding that a film's director is its true author, did Truffaut champion?

American critic Andrew Sarris helped it gain ground in the 1960s after a cool early reception.

What was the title of Truffaut's incendiary 1954 article attacking the 'tradition of quality' in his country's films?

It named eight directors, from Renoir to Tati, as incapable of the 'vile' characters he saw in mainstream French films, and got him a job at a national weekly.

How old was Truffaut when he saw his first film, Abel Gance's Paradis Perdu, and began his obsession?

He later set himself the goals of watching three films a day and reading three books a week after quitting school at 14.

Which childhood friend inspired the character René in The 400 Blows and later worked as an assistant on Truffaut's films?

Truffaut spent as much time as possible away from an unhappy home, often at his friend's.

Which award did The 400 Blows win at the 1959 Cannes Film Festival?

It was also nominated for the Palme d'Or and for an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.

In The 400 Blows, Antoine is accused by his teacher of plagiarising which French novelist?

He had paraphrased the writer from memory in an essay about his grandfather's death; the film ends with a famous freeze-frame at the sea.

How does The 400 Blows famously end?

Editor Walter Murch said the shot 'electrified' him as a young man.

Which Godard landmark of the New Wave was based on a premise supplied by Truffaut?

The two colleagues later fell out spectacularly and never spoke again after 1973.

Which singer starred as the pianist in Truffaut's second feature, Shoot the Piano Player?

Truffaut said he realised mid-shoot that he hated gangsters, so he turned up the comedy; critics loved it, audiences did not.

Shoot the Piano Player was based on the novel Down There by which American crime writer?

Truffaut returned to American pulp repeatedly, adapting Woolrich twice and Charles Williams for his final film.

Which actress played Catherine, the woman at the centre of the love triangle in Jules and Jim?

She won the best actress prize at the 1962 Étoile de Cristal, and Truffaut cast her again in The Bride Wore Black.

In Jules and Jim, what nationality is the shy writer Jules?

He and Jim end up fighting on opposite sides in the First World War, each dreading meeting the other at the front.

Which novelist wrote the books behind both Jules and Jim and Two English Girls?

Truffaut called his passionate-triangle situation, with everyone in love with everyone, a subject dear to his heart.

Which Hollywood film was Truffaut approached to direct in 1963, before he passed and it went to Arthur Penn?

Writers David Newman and Robert Benton wanted to bring the New Wave to Hollywood; Warren Beatty ended up producing.

Fahrenheit 451, Truffaut's only English-language film, was adapted from a novel by which author?

He barely spoke English, and star Oskar Werner stormed off set, forcing him to shoot scenes with a body double from behind.

Which future director served as cinematographer on Fahrenheit 451, Truffaut's first film in colour?

The film flopped commercially and Truffaut never worked outside France again.

Which actress played Christine Darbon, Antoine Doinel's fiancée and later wife, in three films?

Truffaut fell in love with her during Stolen Kisses and they were briefly engaged; she then made her Hollywood debut in Hitchcock's Topaz.

Which 1979 film closed the Antoine Doinel cycle with the couple's divorce?

Truffaut made it after The Green Room flopped at the box office.

The Bride Wore Black and Mississippi Mermaid, Truffaut's Hitchcock homages, were both based on novels by which writer?

Mississippi Mermaid paired Catherine Deneuve with Jean-Paul Belmondo in an identity-bending romantic thriller.

In The Wild Child, Truffaut made his acting debut as which real 18th-century physician?

The doctor tried to civilise Victor of Aveyron, a feral boy found in a forest in 1798.

What is the original French title of Day for Night?

It is the French name for shooting daylight scenes through a filter so they look like night.

What is the name of the melodrama being made within Day for Night?

Truffaut plays its director, Ferrand, and the film opens with a dedication to Lillian and Dorothy Gish.

Which Academy Award did Day for Night win?

Truffaut himself was nominated twice the following year, and the film took three BAFTAs.

Which actress in Day for Night was nominated for the Best Supporting Actress Oscar and won the BAFTA?

She plays Séverine, the fading Italian diva who cannot remember her lines.

Which former friend wrote Truffaut a raucous 1973 letter calling him 'a liar' over Day for Night, prompting a 20-page reply?

Truffaut shot back that his old colleague was 'the Ursula Andress of militancy'; the two never spoke again.

The Story of Adèle H. earned which 20-year-old actress the youngest Best Actress Oscar nomination up to that time?

She played the writer's daughter, whose obsession with a British officer takes her to Halifax.

Adèle H., the subject of Truffaut's 1975 film, was the daughter of which writer?

The story was drawn from her own diaries and shot on location in Guernsey and Senegal.

In which town was Small Change (L'Argent de poche), Truffaut's 1976 film about childhood, set?

Only The 400 Blows and The Last Metro sold more tickets in France than this ensemble portrait of schoolchildren.

Truffaut played scientist Claude Lacombe in which 1977 Hollywood blockbuster?

It is his only acting role in a film he did not direct; Depardieu, Noiret, Trintignant and Lino Ventura were also considered.

Which real UFO researcher was the model for Truffaut's character in Close Encounters?

Co-star Bob Balaban later published a diary of the shoot titled Spielberg, Truffaut & Me.

Truffaut's The Green Room (1978) was based on 'The Altar of the Dead', a story by which author?

Truffaut starred in it himself; critic Jonathan Rosenbaum thinks it may be his best film.

The Man Who Loved Women was remade in 1983 by Blake Edwards with which star as the womaniser?

Julie Andrews played the psychiatrist; in Truffaut's original, Charles Denner's funeral is attended only by women.

The Last Metro is set in a small theatre in which occupied city in 1942?

The title refers to the curfew that forced theatregoers to catch the last train home.

How many César Awards did The Last Metro win from its 12 nominations?

Catherine Deneuve and Gérard Depardieu starred, and the film also earned Oscar and Golden Globe nominations.

In The Last Metro, where is Marion's Jewish husband Lucas secretly hiding?

He listens to rehearsals through a rigged heating vent while his wife Marion runs the company above.

Truffaut's final film, Confidentially Yours (1983), starred which actress with whom he lived until his death?

Shot in black and white as a bookend to his career, it was another Hitchcock homage, based on a Charles Williams novel.

Truffaut's book-length interview with Alfred Hitchcock grew out of a week the two spent talking in 1962 at which studio?

He wanted to convince American critics that the man they saw as a mere entertainer had thought harder about cinema than anyone.

Truffaut named his production company Les Films du Carrosse after a film by which director?

He called this director 'practically infallible' and took the name from The Golden Coach.

According to a 1993 documentary, why did Truffaut once throw a hitchhiker out of his car?

He also kept what was described as a 'fetishistic collection of Eiffel Towers'.

Which German director did Truffaut call 'the most important film director alive'?

His other declared idols were Buñuel, Bergman, Bresson, Rossellini and Hitchcock.

At what age did Truffaut die of a brain tumour in October 1984?

He was due at his friend Miloš Forman's Amadeus premiere, and is buried in Montmartre Cemetery.

With which relative did Truffaut live until he was eight, gaining his love of books and music?

Passed between nannies as a child, he only went to live with his parents after her death.

A 1968 private detective inquiry suggested Truffaut's biological father was a dentist from which town?

His mother's family disputed the finding that Roland Levy was his father, but Truffaut believed and embraced it.

How did the 18-year-old Truffaut end up in military prison in the early 1950s?

He joined the army in 1950 and spent two years trying to get out; André Bazin used political contacts to free him.

In which Paris cemetery is Truffaut buried?

He died in 1984 with numerous further films said to be in preparation.