Crecia C. Swaim
L'Argent de poche
, released in 1976, tells the stories of a community of children and their families in a small town in the center of France. It is an episodic film; it portrays episodes, or small sequences, in several intertwined characters' lives. Although it is a work of fiction, many scenes were inspired by real life.(9) It begins with the town's children running through the streets and alleys to school, immediately letting the viewer in on the small-town communal aspect of these children's lives. They are amazing embodiments of the playful idiosyncrasies of youth, at the same time as they exhibit distinctive individual personalities; the film paints their lives in charming little vignettes. The scenes in this film are memorable, the French is simple and spoken clearly.(10)
The film boasts several Truffaut family cameos. François Truffaut as Martine's father; his younger daughter Eva as the girl in the green dress to go to the movies with Brouillard and Patrick; and his older daughter Laura as Madeleine Doinel, the mother of the whistling boy in the film news short. Also of note, the Asian mother in the film is the film's make-up girl; I am guessing that the girl playing her daughter is her real daughter. The boy Patrick is played by the son of one of Truffaut's friends (Claude de Givray). This film is fabulous for children; however, there are several scenes that you may choose to skip over or otherwise edit by covering the subtitles or the screen. Please see Appendix B for a list of those moments that may be questionable to some audiences, including the nature of the scenes and where they occur.
Forming an Initial Understanding of L'Argent de Poche
According to the CMT reading comprehension strand,
Forming an Initial Understanding
is defined as demonstrating "a basic understanding" of the text's general content. In this unit we are using film as visual text. Students need to be able to pick out the basic themes and actions of a story in order to effectively summarize it; to identify or infer important characters, settings, problems, events, relationships, and details within a film; and to use context clues to determine meanings of unknown or multiple-meaning words, or figurative language. Although in the scheme of things this seems like a relatively simple task, many students struggle with it. This sub-unit is designed to model these skills.
In the following section, I have used CMT guideline questions to create response questions that are engineered to the details of
L'Argent de poche
.(11)
These questions get to the heart of the desired CMT skill development at the same time as they get to the heart of the nuances of the film. For the first four questions, I have provided a list of answer components (labeled AC), to model types of examples from the film that would answer the question. Handing out pre-viewing question sheets is often helpful for students, and you may be as blatant as listing the questions you want answered or as subtle as asking students to "look out for" certain elements you'd like them to be able to write about after viewing. Following the initial four questions are thirty-two more questions which can be used to guide not only lessons and assignments, but also the course of the unit. Scoring rubrics can be found at the CT State Department of Education website.
Q: Based on the opening scene, when all the children are running to school, draw a picture of what you think the town looks like, or how it might be laid out. Explain your drawing with details from the film.
AC: Details include the curving turns of the roads and alleyways, steep slopes, windy, steep staircases, long, thin alleyways, old stone buildings, wrought iron railings. Students cross an old-looking bridge, everything is pretty old-looking. It seems like people live up high, and school and commerce are lower down the hill (where Julien lives.) (12)
Q: Describe Mlle. Petit's teaching style. Do you agree or disagree with it? Why?
AC: She has students memorize scenes, is stern and exacting with them, drills dates and events or occurrences; she is fast-paced, firm, and demanding. Sometimes she is insulting to students, although she seems to do it to show she expects students to do as they should.
Q: Does the general meaning of the phrase "pocket money" fit the story? Use information in the film to support your answer.
AC: Children in the film talk about their own pocket money, or allowance; what they choose to spend it on varies by child. Demousseau buys books, yet does not do well in school; the De Luca boys spend their pocket money on candy and the pool. Whether or not a character has pocket money seems to define him; or conversely, whether or not a character has pocket money, they are all part of the same world and so all equal. Pocket money is that little bit of money you've got on you for day-to-day expenses; it can represent the stuff of daily life, clearly represented in the film, or it can represent a freedom from the pains and obligations of daily life, a whimsy so often replaced by responsibility as the child transitions into adulthood.
Q: The film title's literal English translation is "Pocket Money," but the American version is called "Small Change." Does this change the meaning of the film? If so, how?
AC: Small change implies something of little value or importance, whereas pocket money implies that although it may not be much, it's a little something extra. You are given pocket money, but are left with small change. For an American, the difference in word choice could change the meaning considerably. I am not certain if Truffaut preferred one interpretation over the other, although from his background, he may have meant the interpretation concerning small change more, since sometimes the children in the film seem to be treated like small change by their parents.
Q: Compare and contrast your daily trip to school with that of the children in the film.
Q: Why do you think that Brouillard refuses to put emotion into his recitation of Harpagnan's scene in
L'Avare
until the teacher leaves the room?
Q: Why do you think Mademoiselle Petit got so upset with Brouillard for his lackluster recitation, when other students recited in much the same way?
Q: What would you do if you were a principal of a school, and Welfare sent a child to your school during the last weeks of school? Explain your answer, using information from the film to support your answer.
Q: Do you think there is a connection between the scene the students are reciting, which begins "Thieves, Assassins, Murderers, Justice," and Julien's arrival to the school? Use information from the film to explain your answer.
Q: What can you deduce about Julien from the following conversation?
Brouillard: "Do you live around here?"
Julien: "I live in the Mureaux."
Brouillard: "That's not a housing area."
Julien: "Is that so? Well, I live there."
Q: Write a BRIEF paragraph summarizing the character of Julien Leclou.
Q: Why does Julien ask an older boy what was on television the night before?
Q: What did Julien throw in the gutter? Why?
Q: When Mlle. Petit wakes Julien up in the middle of a lesson, she scolds him and says: "Julien, you look completely haggard. I'm sure you don't even know what that means." What do
you
think she means by that last statement?
Q: Why do you think the filmmaker included the scene when Gregory makes a mess with the groceries and starts to play with a hammer, in the Richer apartment?
Q: In the scene when Gregory falls out the window, Truffaut has said that he was trying to show the way children bounce back from life easier than adults. Do you think that scene was successful? Why or why not?
Q: When Mme. Richer tells the story of Gregory's fall to her husband, he asks why none of the people watching tried to stop him. She replies that everyone was helpless. What do you think about that? Explain your answer using examples from the film.
Q: Mme. Richer says that kids are much tougher than adults are. Do you agree with her? Why or why not?
Q: Why do you think there are so many shots of windows and doors and the outsides of buildings in this film? Explain your answer.
Q: Why do you think the song in the film says that "children are bored on Sundays?" Use examples from the film to support your answer.
Q: Why do you think the song in the film says that "parents are bored on Sundays?" Use examples from the film to support your answer.
Q: Are Julien and Patrick friends? Why or why not? (Does the fact that Julien steals the hood ornament from the car Patrick is washing affect your response?)
Q: What do you think Sylvie meant when she said "Everyone looked at me" after she used the megaphone to tell the neighbors she was hungry?
Q: Who goes to the movies in the film? What do you think that means?
Q: The woman who runs the daycare center where Gregory goes says that children annoy her because "they always do what they shouldn't." Then she says "but I have a sense of duty." What does she mean by that? What do you think about that?
Q: Why do you think Patrick eats so much when he has dinner at Laurent Riffle's house?
Q: M. Richer says that because the De Luca brothers bought toy guns with money that was not theirs, then the toys are not theirs, and must be returned. Do you agree? Why?
Q: Why does Patrick buy roses for Mme. Riffle?
Q: When the police inspector asks Mlle. Petit if she noticed anything wrong with Julien, she bursts into tears. Why? What do you think of her reaction?
Q: Richer tells Petit that she should not feel guilty that she didn't realize what was happening with Julien, that he "made a point of covering up his home life." What do you think about that?
Q: What do you think of the frank way M. Richer tells the students about what has happened to Julien and what will become of him?
Q: M. Richer says: "An unhappy adult can start again from scratch. But an unhappy child is helpless." Do you agree with him? Why or why not?
Q: What are two types of unhappiness shown in the film?
Attention:
That's two different
types
, not instances, of unhappiness. What is the difference between the two?
Q: "Some of us who've had a difficult childhood are better equipped for adult life than those who were over-protected with love." Do you agree with Monsieur Richer here? Why or why not?
Q: Give a brief summary of who Martine and Patrick are, how they met, how they could have known each other before that point, and what you think of it all.
Q: Next year the school is going co-ed. What do you think will change? What will remain the same? What do you think this means for education?
For a lesson stressing the connection between character's names, faces, and characteristics, see
Lesson Plan 2 - The characters of
L'Argent de Poche.