DAY FOR NIGHT (La nuit américaine) (1973) - ♦♦♦♦♦

Directed by - Francois Truffaut

Written by - Francois Truffaut, Jean-Louis Richard, Suzanne Schiffman

Starring - Jacqueline Bisset, Valentina Cortese, Dani, Alexandra Stewart, Jean-Pierre Aumont, Jean Champion, Jean-Pierre Leaud, Francois Truffaut

"Many films have been made about filmmaking, but DAY FOR NIGHT has an air of freshness about it that remains unparalleled. The story talks about a director, played by TRUFFAUT himself, who is trying to maintaing his creative and artistic integrity but would realistically be happy enough to simply be able to complete his latest picture, especially given the different personal and professional crisis experienced by the cast and crew throughout the production. 

To call DAY FOR NIGHT a film about filmmaking would in fact only be a half truth - it is every bit as personal as THE 400 BLOWS, and to some extent even just as autobiographical. It is well documented that TRUFFAUT had a tumultuous upbringing defined among other things by constant clashing with his parents. The idea represented in DAY FOR NIGHT, one of his masterpieces, is that a film production, cast and crew included, is something stronger than a microcosm. It is a surrogate family, where each member fits into familial character traits, relationships are born and die within the blink of an eye and day to day crisis are lived to with great intensity. It is just as much an alternative reality, that lies somewhere between real life and film. Furthermore, a film production is presented as fulfilling a need for closeness that real life cannot offer. 

As such, DAY FOR NIGHT remains an eclectic vision, and does not focus on individual characters but rather the collective, which features such characters as a young heart throb enamoured with cinema by JEAN-PIERRE LEAUD and a british actress in the middle of a nervous breakdown played by JACQUELINE BISSET. There are many intertwining storylines, that unravel with unpredictability and at a frantic pace, but everything fits quite flawlessly and with energetically, supported by its sense of humour, that conveys the eccentricity of its colourful characters characters. 

Underneath it all, however, it is just as easy to be won over by the subtleness of the sensitivity of FRANCOIS TRUFFAUT's film, a love letter to filmmaking, and the wonder of its illusion through its industry exposé, some of which is self referential of his past work. This was perhaps the first time an audience found out how cinema made it snow on sunny days, of that night scenes could be shot during the day."

Drama, France/Italy