Hoezo in KINO

Casting calls for Francois Truffaut’s incredible debut feature had the director searching for a suitable lead when a fresh-faced Jean-Pierre Léaud walked in to audition. Truffaut was so taken by his screentest, that he actually doctored the footage into this film by replacing his own off-camera voice with a female one playing a psychiatrist. Léaud’s raw talent and kinetic charm were a perfect avatar for the director’s autobiographical story of a boy under the spell of cinema but being let down by his surroundings and turning to adolescent mischief. Les quatre cents coups (meaning ‘raising hell’) is an early Nouvelle Vague gem that experimented visually but also presented the city of Paris, dealing with poverty and early immigration, in an unflinching manner that was often shocking for the contemporary French viewer unaccustomed to this representation of their capitol. We’re proud to present this recently restored version of the early New Wave classic that deserves to be experienced on a big screen as it was the first French film shot in anamorphic widescreen (2.35:1 ratio). French language with English subtitles.