François Truffaut
French film director (1932–1984)
A director's score is the sum of their films' composite canon scores — methodology.
- Born
- February 6, 1932 · Paris
- Died
- October 21, 1984 · Neuilly-sur-Seine
- Nationality
- France
- Work
- film director, film producer, film critic, actor
- Movement
- French New Wave
The critic who had to prove it
Truffaut is the rare case of a theorist forced to make good on his own argument. As a young reviewer he was so merciless that French cinema nicknamed him its gravedigger, and in 1954 his essay "Une certaine tendance du cinéma français" indicted the scriptwriters' cinema of the day while sparing a handful of directors he judged true authors. The auteur theory he championed at Cahiers du Cinéma — that the director, not the screenwriter, is a film's real author — was a fighting position, not an academic one. Then, having been barred from the 1958 Cannes festival for his attacks, he returned in 1959 with a debut that won him Best Director there and put the theory beyond dispute. He had said the director was the author; The 400 Blows (1959) proved it in one autobiographical stroke.
Paris, Bazin, and the New Wave's first shot
Born in Paris on February 6, 1932, Truffaut had a truant, unsettled childhood that the critic André Bazin twice rescued — from delinquency and later from an army desertion charge — before installing him at Cahiers. That mentorship is the hinge of his life: the wounded boy of The 400 Blows, played by Jean-Pierre Léaud, is Truffaut, and Léaud went on to age in real time across the Antoine Doinel cycle — Stolen Kisses (1968), Bed and Board (1970), Love on the Run (1979) — a running self-portrait no other director has attempted at that length. Between the Doinel films he ranged widely: the gangster pastiche Shoot the Piano Player (1960), the ménage-à-trois of Jules and Jim (1962), a lone English-language experiment in Fahrenheit 451 (1966), and the book-length interview with Hitchcock that reshaped how the medium talks about itself. Day for Night (1973), in which he played the harried director Ferrand, won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film; Spielberg then cast him as a scientist in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. The Last Metro (1980) swept the Césars. He died at Neuilly-sur-Seine on October 21, 1984, aged 52.
Warmth as a method
Where Godard turned the New Wave toward theory and rupture, Truffaut kept faith with the audience — with story, with actors, with the movie-love that had raised him in the dark. That generosity is easy to mistake for softness. It isn't: the tenderness in his best work is a considered refusal of cruelty, a bet that intimacy is harder to earn on screen than shock.
What the numbers say
Our library ranks Truffaut #23 among all directors at a composite 19.59 across 19 films — high, but carried by a narrow peak. The 400 Blows leads him at #56 (4.04), well ahead of Day for Night at #123 (3.25), and there the curve drops off a cliff: Jules and Jim at #379, Shoot the Piano Player at #493, Small Change at #857, The Last Metro at #1011, and everything else below #1300. No reversal at the top here — The 400 Blows also draws the most citations of any Truffaut film, appearing on 15 of our source lists to Day for Night's 10. Breadth of mention and intensity of regard, for once, land on the same film.
Where to start
The 400 Blows first — it is the New Wave's opening statement and Truffaut's whole biography in ninety minutes. Then Jules and Jim for the lyric register, and Day for Night for the man watching himself work.
Films in our library, ranked
Ranked by composite canon score across 20+ authoritative lists, awards and polls — our ordering, with every placement citing its evidence on the film's page.
- 1
1959 · France · drama, crime
Sight & Sound 2022 directors' poll #33 · Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #50 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1959 #5
4.0415 citations - 2
1973 · France / Italy · drama, comedy
BAFTA Best Film winner 1974 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1974 #3 · Siskel's annual top 10 1974 #1
3.2510 citations - 3
1962 · France · romance, drama
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1962 #2 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1964 #2 · Empire 500 (2008) #338
2.017 citations - 4
1960 · France · film-noir, drama, crime
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1960 #4 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1963 #9 · Scorsese's 39 essential foreign films
1.708 citations - 5Small ChangeL'argent de poche
1976 · France · comedy, drama
Ebert's annual top 10 1976 #1 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1976 #3 · Siskel's annual top 10 1976 #4
1.223 citations - 6The Last MetroLe Dernier Métro
1980 · France · drama, romance, war
César Best Film winner 1981 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies · Criterion Collection spine #462
1.083 citations - 7Stolen KissesBaisers volés
1968 · France · comedy, romance, drama
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1968 #8 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies · Sarris's annual top 10 1969 #7
0.925 citations - 8The Woman Next DoorLa Femme d'à côté
1981 · France · drama
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1981 #5 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1983 #6 · Sarris's annual top 10 1981 #10
0.893 citations - 9The Soft SkinLa Peau douce
1964 · France / Portugal · drama
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1965 #4 · Criterion Collection spine #749 · Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema
0.703 citations - 10Bed and BoardDomicile conjugal
1970 · France · comedy, romance, drama
NYT Best 1,000 Movies · Siskel's annual top 10 1971 #7 · Criterion Collection spine #187
0.644 citations - 11The Bride Wore BlackLa mariée était en noir
1968 · France / Italy · drama, crime, mystery
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1968 #10 · Sarris's annual top 10 1968 #6 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
0.633 citations - 12The Wild ChildL'Enfant sauvage
1970 · France / United States · drama
NYT Best 1,000 Movies · Ebert's annual top 10 1970 #9 · Siskel's annual top 10 1970 #10
0.574 citations - 13Two English GirlsLes Deux Anglaises et le Continent
1971 · France · drama, romance
Sarris's annual top 10 1972 #5 · Siskel's annual top 10 1972 #5 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
0.553 citations - 14The Story of Adele H.L'Histoire d'Adèle H.
1975 · France · drama, biography
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1976 #7 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
0.502 citations - 15Love on the RunL'Amour en fuite
1979 · France · drama, romance
NYT Best 1,000 Movies · Criterion Collection spine #188
0.332 citations - 16The Man Who Loved WomenL'Homme qui aimait les femmes
1977 · France · comedy, romance
NYT Best 1,000 Movies
0.171 citation - 170.141 citation
- 180.111 citation
- 190.111 citation
Complete filmography
All 27 directorial credits recorded on Wikidata, in chronological order; films in our library link to their canon-score page.
- 1955Une Visite
- 1957Les Mistons
- 1958A Story of Water
- 1959The 400 Blows
- 1960Shoot the Piano Player
- 1962Antoine and Colette
- 1962Jules and Jim
- 1962Los 4 Golpes
- 1962Love at Twenty
- 1964The Soft Skin
- 1966Fahrenheit 451
- 1968Stolen Kisses
- 1968The Bride Wore Black
- 1969Mississippi Mermaid
- 1970Bed and Board
- 1970The Wild Child
- 1971Two English Girls
- 1972Such a Gorgeous Kid Like Me
- 1973Day for Night
- 1975The Story of Adele H.
- 1976Small Change
- 1977The Man Who Loved Women
- 1978The Green Room
- 1979Love on the Run
- 1980The Last Metro
- 1981The Woman Next Door
- 1983Confidentially Yours