The films created by Francois Truffaut can be appreciated on many levels. As an auteur, he has complete aesthetic control over every aspect of his works, providing his audience with deliberate avenues that they can explore in order to comprehend more fully the complex characters, their situations, and the main themes. Acutely aware of the other arts, he recurrently makes references to literature, music, and art in his films—not only to provide suitable reinforcements of the mise en scène but, more importantly, to function as symbols which, in turn, extend the meaning of the cinema into an all-inclusive art. The question of mixed genres has dual implications: it suggests, first, that one must be aware of these references as narrative elements and secondly, that one must know about the works and their creators so that their underlying meaning can be interpreted as they appear in the...