Antoine (Jean-Pierre Léaud) and Christine (Claude Jade) dine on baby food in BED AND BOARD
BED AND BOARD (DOMICILE CONJUGAL) (François Truffaut, 1970)
Film Forum
209 West Houston St.
Wednesday, April 9, 1:15, 3:15, 5:15, 7:40, 9:45
Festival continues through April 17
212-727-8110
www.filmforum.org
When we first encounter Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre Léaud) in Bed and Board, he is running down stairs to dye flowers, complaining that one flower always remains unchanged. Of course, that unchanging flower is Antoine himself, who we’ve watched grow up in François Truffaut’s The 400 Blows, Antoine and Colette, and Stolen Kisses. (Bed and Board was supposed to be the final chapter, but Truffaut and Léaud teamed up again in 1979 for Love on the Run.) The upstart adolescent is far from being mature, even though he has now married Christine (Claude Jade) and is preparing to have a baby. Antoine is still very much a child, unable to face any serious responsibilities. When he gets a new job, it’s steering motorized boats on a pond at a hydraulics company, in a miniature version of a port; it’s like a doll’s house for men, a rehearsal for real, full-size life. He is still desexualized; when he’s in bed with his wife, he wants to nickname each of her breasts, which he claims are different sizes, instead of seeing them as beautiful erogenous zones. When they don’t have anything to eat in the apartment, he decides to dine on baby food with Christine. And when Christine’s parents (Claire Duhamel and Daniel Ceccaldi) come to see the baby, his father-in-law wants to make sure that Antoine doesn’t keep their present of a toy duck for himself. Antoine hasn’t grown out of his own fantasy world, and he still doesn’t understand that there are consequences to his actions, especially when he becomes interested in a beguiling Japanese woman named Kyoko (Hiroko Berghauer). He is surrounded by characters who live in the building and gather in the courtyard — a man (Jacques Rispal) who hasn’t stepped outside in decades, a waitress (Danièle Girard) who has the hots for Antoine, a gregarious bar owner (Jacques Jouanneau), and a new stranger (Claude Véga) everyone calls the Strangler — but he’s yet to really decide on his own character. Despite their monetary woes — Christine gives violin lessons in their home to make money — Antoine keeps lending more and more cash to a sponging friend (Jacques Robiolles) as if he’s made of francs. But Antoine clearly doesn’t know what he’s made of, at least not yet.
Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre Léaud) still has plenty of growing up to do as Truffaut’s Nouvelle Vague cycle continues
Bed and Board (or, perhaps, Bed and Bored?) is a charming yet bittersweet romantic comedy that is at times extremely frustrating. Having followed Antoine’s life for so long, we ache to see him make the right decisions, yet hate ourselves for giving him the benefit of the doubt when he makes such wrongheaded, selfish choices. “You are my sister, my daughter, my mother,” he tells Christine, who answers, “I’d hoped to be your wife.” Shot on location by Nestor Almendros in an actual apartment complex, the film has a welcoming, natural feel, as if we’re part of Antoine’s extended family. Truffaut, who cowrote the script with Bernard Revon, has lighthearted fun with the details, adding unique flourishes while paying tribute to such cinema greats as Jacques Tati, Alain Resnais, John Ford, and Orson Welles. Bed and Board is screening April 9 as part of Film Forum’s “Tout Truffaut” series, which continues through April 17 with such other Truffaut treasures as Two English Girls, Day for Night, Small Change, Mississippi Mermaid, and The Last Metro.