The first feature by François Truffaut has a claim to being the origin of the New Wave (it is not unchallenged in that claim); it is also the first, and by far best, of Jean-Pierre Léaud's appearances in the ongoing Antoine Doinel role. The first part -- the escapades around Paris of a precocious schoolboy with a passion for, among other things, Balzac -- possesses something of the Jean Vigo spirit, the inventiveness and the anarchy and the pure raw energy. But the last part -- the incarceration in reform school -- is a social tract much more lead-footed and woolen-coated than anything in Vigo. (1959) — Duncan Shepherd
This movie is not currently in theaters.