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France released, PAL/Region 2 DVD: LANGUAGES: English ( Dolby Digital 2.0 ), French ( Dolby Digital 2.0 ), German ( Dolby Digital 2.0 ), Spanish ( Dolby Digital 2.0 ), Czech ( Subtitles ), Dutch ( Subtitles ), English ( Subtitles ), German ( Subtitles ), Greek ( Subtitles ), Hungarian ( Subtitles ), Italian ( Subtitles ), Portuguese ( Subtitles ), Spanish ( Subtitles ), Swedish ( Subtitles ), Turkish ( Subtitles ), SPECIAL FEATURES: Cast/Crew Interview(s), Commentary, Interactive Menu, Scene Access, SYNOPSIS: Known to English-speaking audiences as Day for Night, La nuit americaine was director Francois Truffaut's loving and humorous tribute to the communal insanity of making a movie. The film details the making of a family drama called 'Meet Pamela' about the tragedy that follows when a young French man introduces his parents to his new British wife. Truffaut gently satirizes his own films with 'Meet Pamela's overwrought storyline, but the real focus is on the chaos behind the scenes. One of the central actresses is continually drunk due to family problems, while the other is prone to emotional instability, and the male lead (Truffaut regular Jean-Pierre Leaud) starts to act erratically when his intermittent romance with the fickle script girl begins to fail. In addition to all this personal drama, the film is besieged by technical problems, from difficult tracking shots to stubborn animal actors. The inspiration for future satires of movie-making from Living in Oblivion to Irma Vep, La nuit americaine was considered slight by some critics in comparison to earlier Truffaut masterworks, but it went on to win the 1973 Oscar for Best Foreign Film. SCREENED/AWARDED AT: BAFTA Awards, Golden Globes, Oscar Academy Awards, ...Day for Night ( La Nuit américaine ) ( The American Night )
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
18 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
This is a truly fabulous film, I have seen it many times.
Francois Truffaut's homage to the world of film includes an over possessive producer's wife who sits and knits on the film set, a glamorous female lead with the insecurities of a child and a disobedient kitten that doesn't want the cream.
Jean Pierre Aumont's (Alexandre) excitement at the arrival of his son on the set is particularly moving and Valentina Cortese's (Severine) attempts to learn her lines with the assistance of numbers is unbearably hilarious.
This film reflects Truffaut's lust for life, how sad for us all that his life was so short.
Francois Truffaut's homage to the world of film includes an over possessive producer's wife who sits and knits on the film set, a glamorous female lead with the insecurities of a child and a disobedient kitten that doesn't want the cream.
Jean Pierre Aumont's (Alexandre) excitement at the arrival of his son on the set is particularly moving and Valentina Cortese's (Severine) attempts to learn her lines with the assistance of numbers is unbearably hilarious.
This film reflects Truffaut's lust for life, how sad for us all that his life was so short.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By Alice Lane
Format:DVD|Amazon Verified Purchase
The film is still a classic. Unfortunately, the DVD I received is an Italian one although the outer case is in French. The outer case, like the Amazon description, promises subtitles in various languages including English, and extra commentaries. The actual disc has only subtitles in French or Italian and no extras at all.
Do not buy this DVD based on the description on Amazon, it is incorrect and the product is not as advertised.
I shall not buy anything from this seller - ARVOnline - again.
Do not buy this DVD based on the description on Amazon, it is incorrect and the product is not as advertised.
I shall not buy anything from this seller - ARVOnline - again.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
Along with Fahrenheit 451, Day For Night is easily Francois Truffaut's most playful film. It works where so many subsequent moviemaking movies don't because Truffaut doesn't put the director at the center of the picture, or indeed the movies themselves: it may be set in a movie studio on a troubled picture, but it's all about people and about love in its various forms. Moreover, for all the pains and tantrums and breakdowns, there's a real love for and acceptance its characters that makes it a particularly joyful experience. Throw in some great performances from a fine ensemble cast - not least the oft-overlooked Jean-Pierre Aumont - and a wonderful Georges Delerue score, and it's hard not to fall under its spell.
If you like the film, now is the time to pick up either Warner's excellent Region 1 disc or MK2's French PAL disc (with English subtitles on the feature and a slew of unsubtitled different extras) as both companies are being sued by the Truffaut estate over the film, which may make it unavailable for the forseable future.
If you like the film, now is the time to pick up either Warner's excellent Region 1 disc or MK2's French PAL disc (with English subtitles on the feature and a slew of unsubtitled different extras) as both companies are being sued by the Truffaut estate over the film, which may make it unavailable for the forseable future.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By Filmfan
Format:DVD
All of Truffaut's works are autobiographical. Day for Night is merely the most obvious case of this self-scrutiny. It has the loose charm of many of his films. It begins with a scene in which there are too many people, in which there is too much light and too much charm. To the casual eye, this looks like a misjudgement of direction. By the end of the film, however, the mistakes have all been corrected by the real director (Truffaut as the normal, invisible, Truffaut rather than the version we see playing himself) and the scene works powerfully.
Truffaut is capable of self-parody and this film proves it. And yet, it teases us for a long time. Is it really just a much less sophisticated version of Fellini's 'Otto E Mezzo'? After all, the black-and-white flashbacks of the mini-Truffaut look like a completely misapplied understanding of Fellini's subtle Jungian detours into memory and fantasy. And, if the film had continued in this vein, with the story's director (Truffaut playing himself) seeming remote and uninteresting, we would have thought the film an embarrassing failure.
Yet, from the moment that Jacqueline Bisset appears, the film jumps into a more pressing and infinitely more vital version of itself. We now have a real film-star, rather than the pretend ones and we engage more deeply with the story, because of the magic of film narrative. Leaud plays his usual self: vain, childish, selfish, barely professional, a parody, in fact, of the idea of an actor an even of Leaud to this point in his career with Truffaut.... Read more ›
Truffaut is capable of self-parody and this film proves it. And yet, it teases us for a long time. Is it really just a much less sophisticated version of Fellini's 'Otto E Mezzo'? After all, the black-and-white flashbacks of the mini-Truffaut look like a completely misapplied understanding of Fellini's subtle Jungian detours into memory and fantasy. And, if the film had continued in this vein, with the story's director (Truffaut playing himself) seeming remote and uninteresting, we would have thought the film an embarrassing failure.
Yet, from the moment that Jacqueline Bisset appears, the film jumps into a more pressing and infinitely more vital version of itself. We now have a real film-star, rather than the pretend ones and we engage more deeply with the story, because of the magic of film narrative. Leaud plays his usual self: vain, childish, selfish, barely professional, a parody, in fact, of the idea of an actor an even of Leaud to this point in his career with Truffaut.... Read more ›
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By bainbridge
Format:DVD
I saw this film when it first came out and have tried to get it on dvd ever since
now that I have it on dvd it is as good as when I first saw it in the seventies
it is clever being a film about making a film; it is enjoyable ; it is fun; it is truffaut
if you like truffaut,which I do, buy it
highly recommended
now that I have it on dvd it is as good as when I first saw it in the seventies
it is clever being a film about making a film; it is enjoyable ; it is fun; it is truffaut
if you like truffaut,which I do, buy it
highly recommended
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By Stephanie DePue
TOP 1000 REVIEWER
Format:DVD
"Day for Night," ("La Nuit Americaine," 1973), is a widely-distributed French film by one of the leaders of the French "nouvelle vague" (New Wave) school of filmmaking, Francois Truffaut (The Francois Truffaut Collection - 6 Disc Box Set (Exclusive to Amazon.co.uk) [DVD] [1959]). It is a comedy/drama, a movie for people who love movies, made by a director - Truffaut--who certainly loved movie-making, and who plays the director, Ferrand, struggling to complete his movie within the movie while in the midst of a storm of financial troubles, and personal and professional problems among cast and crew.
The cast is certainly distinguished. The lovely Jacqueline Bisset (The Deep [DVD]) stars as Julie Baker, the troubled American film star whom the company needs to make a financial success of the picture they are making. The veteran Italian actress Valentina Cortese (Tito Gobbi - the Glass Mountain + Lucia Highlights [2005] [DVD] [NTSC]) plays Severine, veteran actress; the veteran French actor Jean-Pierre Aumont (FIVE MILES TO MIDNIGHT (All Region import) Sophia Loren) plays Alexandre, veteran actor. They've previously worked together in Hollywood, and, apparently, are also better-acquainted than that, although Alexandre's sexuality will come into question during the making of the movie. Jean-Pierre Leaud,(]) whom Truffaut frequently used to play a young man not unlike himself, plays Alphonse, an erratic, talented, selfish and spoiled young actor. Nathalie Baye(Catch Me If You Can [DVD] [2002]), now a very popular leading French actress, in her first job fresh out of the Academie Francaise, France's most distinguished acting school, plays the script girl Joelle. The French veteran Jean Champion plays Bertrand. Graham Greene, the great English novelist, (Our Man in Havana (Vintage Classics)), who sometimes lived on the Riviera, and whom Truffaut was anxious to meet, plays an unaccredited cameo as an insurance man: Truffaut wasn't informed of his identity until later.
The film's score, a tuneful beauty, is by Georges Delerue. The script was written by Truffaut, with his frequent collaborator Suzanne Schiffman, and Jean-Louis Richard; it was, of course, directed by Truffaut. It's one of his last films, and was meant to be, with the theater-oriented The Last Metro [Blu-ray] [1980] [US Import], one of a group of films saluting the French lively arts.
The picture is set largely in the south of France, at the famous -within France, at least - Victorine Studios, an old facility whose still-standing street scapes, used in earlier movies but never torn down due to the expense involved, quite likely enabled Truffaut's movie to be made, from the financial point of view. It deals accurately, lovingly, with the difficulties involved in making a picture, from finding a cat that can act, to the death of a principal actor during filming. It shows Ferrand, the director, as a deaf man who lives what he does, and is willing to deal with any difficulties that come up. At one point he explains to his troubled people that they mustn't expect real life to be as neatly organized as the movies. However, Ferrand is also, as is Truffaut's director in "The Last Metro," willing to use any scrap of the turmoil of his cast and crew, and/or to create more turmoil, if it will strengthen his product. It's rather mild, as movies go, but there's rarely been a more clear-eyed, meticulous or affectionate portrayal of movies as they are made, and it did win an Oscar. It's still worth seeing. Read more ›
The cast is certainly distinguished. The lovely Jacqueline Bisset (The Deep [DVD]) stars as Julie Baker, the troubled American film star whom the company needs to make a financial success of the picture they are making. The veteran Italian actress Valentina Cortese (Tito Gobbi - the Glass Mountain + Lucia Highlights [2005] [DVD] [NTSC]) plays Severine, veteran actress; the veteran French actor Jean-Pierre Aumont (FIVE MILES TO MIDNIGHT (All Region import) Sophia Loren) plays Alexandre, veteran actor. They've previously worked together in Hollywood, and, apparently, are also better-acquainted than that, although Alexandre's sexuality will come into question during the making of the movie. Jean-Pierre Leaud,(]) whom Truffaut frequently used to play a young man not unlike himself, plays Alphonse, an erratic, talented, selfish and spoiled young actor. Nathalie Baye(Catch Me If You Can [DVD] [2002]), now a very popular leading French actress, in her first job fresh out of the Academie Francaise, France's most distinguished acting school, plays the script girl Joelle. The French veteran Jean Champion plays Bertrand. Graham Greene, the great English novelist, (Our Man in Havana (Vintage Classics)), who sometimes lived on the Riviera, and whom Truffaut was anxious to meet, plays an unaccredited cameo as an insurance man: Truffaut wasn't informed of his identity until later.
The film's score, a tuneful beauty, is by Georges Delerue. The script was written by Truffaut, with his frequent collaborator Suzanne Schiffman, and Jean-Louis Richard; it was, of course, directed by Truffaut. It's one of his last films, and was meant to be, with the theater-oriented The Last Metro [Blu-ray] [1980] [US Import], one of a group of films saluting the French lively arts.
The picture is set largely in the south of France, at the famous -within France, at least - Victorine Studios, an old facility whose still-standing street scapes, used in earlier movies but never torn down due to the expense involved, quite likely enabled Truffaut's movie to be made, from the financial point of view. It deals accurately, lovingly, with the difficulties involved in making a picture, from finding a cat that can act, to the death of a principal actor during filming. It shows Ferrand, the director, as a deaf man who lives what he does, and is willing to deal with any difficulties that come up. At one point he explains to his troubled people that they mustn't expect real life to be as neatly organized as the movies. However, Ferrand is also, as is Truffaut's director in "The Last Metro," willing to use any scrap of the turmoil of his cast and crew, and/or to create more turmoil, if it will strengthen his product. It's rather mild, as movies go, but there's rarely been a more clear-eyed, meticulous or affectionate portrayal of movies as they are made, and it did win an Oscar. It's still worth seeing. Read more ›
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4.1 out of 5 stars
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
It Ain't Hollywood!
This sparkling comedy drama from French master director Francois Traffaut is the sort of self-loving, semi-mock at The Industry that they - and the critics - all love. Read more
Published 11 months ago by Tim Kidner
1.0 out of 5 stars
Day for Night
I wanted to see this film and was very dissapointed when it arrived and there were no English subtitles so it will have to go back.
Published 16 months ago by Jono
5.0 out of 5 stars
One more superlative: audio comment by Nathalie Baye
La nuit Américaine (Day for Night, 1973) by François Truffaut has already ten reviews in amazon uk, all at the five star artistic rating level. Read more
Published 22 months ago by Dr René Codoni
5.0 out of 5 stars
How a movie gets made is more interesting than the movie itself.
A film about filmmaking.
Almost a soap opera, with everyone on the set 'up to something'. Pretty funny and pretty sexy. Read more
Almost a soap opera, with everyone on the set 'up to something'. Pretty funny and pretty sexy. Read more
Published on 2 Mar 2011 by Philoctetes
5.0 out of 5 stars
The problems of film making
A classic that was unavailable in Region 2 format for years! An affectionate look of the problems of a film director. Great fun!
Published on 17 Feb 2010 by The Old Bill
5.0 out of 5 stars
A movie-buff's movie, for everyone
This is the definitive movie-lover's movie, especially if you love the French film, and Francois Truffaut. Read more
Published on 31 Aug 2009 by M. W. Ellwood
5.0 out of 5 stars
Genius at work
Truffaut was the archetypal poacher turned gamekeeper; the film critic who thought he could do better so he became a director. And what a director! Read more
Published on 17 July 2009 by Thermos
4.0 out of 5 stars
Truffauts gentle satire
Although not as intense as most of his work, "Day for Night" is a gentle homage to the complexities of film making, both the mechanics of filming and the unpredicatability of the... Read more
Published on 10 May 2009 by Hon Cgo Bridgeman
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