Top Ranked Films of François Truffaut

François Truffaut
5 titles, 29th in points with 20,408

These are all the films of Truffaut’s that made the top 1000 in our 2011 update of the Top Ranked 1000 Films on the Net, all polls.

1. The 400 Blows (1959) France, bw #37
2. Jules et Jim (1961) #73
3. Day for Night (1973) #334
4. Shoot the Piano Player (1960) #427
5. Wild Child, The (1970) #904

He had 4 more outside the top 1000
6. Two English Girls (1971) #1204
7. Woman Next Door, The (1981) #1300
8. Stolen Kisses (1968) #1767
9. Fahrenheit 451 (1966) #2065

I think they got Truffaut right, good enough ranking for me. 400 Blows is also my favorite, a largely improvised debut film with a non-professional actor in the lead role. Much of this film is auto-biographical, a reflection backward by a 25-yr old film critic of his boyhood and the influence of movies on his aimless life.

Most of these may be considered a bit light, such as Day For Night or Stolen Kisses, but at the very least Truffaut’s love of films is evident in nearly all of these. Shoot the Piano Player is his tribute to film noir, and a pretty good film in its own right. Jules and Jim is an oddball romantic triangle, led by a sparkling Jeanne Moreau. Perhaps a little overrated, it remains fresh and interesting today.

Truffaut also had an acting role in Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), as the scientist that was the musical expert working with sound to communicate to the aliens.

See the full list of top ranked 100 directors here: Top Ranked 100 Directors, 2011 Edition