After the final freeze frame of The 400 Blows and the charming Antoine and Colette, I was looking forward to Stolen Kisses (Baisers volés), the third installment in Truffaut's Antoine Doinel series. While pleasant fare with its likeable hero and magical Parisian scenery, Stolen Kisses is little more than a lightweight romantic comedy lacking the angst and character development of either predecessor.

Stolen Kisses was Truffaut's most commercially successful film and won the Prix Louis Delluc upon its 1968 and won Truffaut the Best Director award for the United States National Society of Film Critics two years later. This had to be a surprise to Truffaut, as there is little evidence that he spent a great deal of time developing Stolen Kisses. It feels much more like a loose fitting series of improvisations shot effortlessly on picturesque Parisian locations. There is such an uneven feel to the piece.

Truffaut's camera only captures glimpses of Antoine, the rebel underdog. Most of the time Antoine seems remarkably ordinary, as Truffaut abandons the lovable character from the first two films--a character very much in Chaplin's little Tramp tradition (the charming anti-authoritarian loser who never gets the girl).

For a while it appears that the old Antoine will make his reappearance, even with Truffaut's uneven camera work. Paralleling Truffaut's military career, the film begins with Antoine in military prison, his head buried in a book, being called in front of a military superior for review. As the officer rattles off Antoine's numerous AWOL violations, Antoine smirks and makes faces for the camera to let us know that the rebel is back in form.

Truffaut informs us of his camera presence immediately afterwards with his long boom shot over a busy Paris intersection as Antoine energetically sprints across the street to visit a local whorehouse. The bumbling Antoine acts like he hasn't seen a woman for years, as he attacks the first prostitute with such aggressive kisses that she fends him off. His repressed sexual desires rear up again later when he aggressively attempts to kiss his girlfriend Christine (Claude Jade).

Appropriately Antoine lives in the Montmartre area, with a beautiful view of the Sacré-Coeur from his apartment window. Montmartre is the bohemian section of Paris that attracts artists, writers, poets, and other creative types. It also contains numerous cabarets and bordellos that give it a reputation for depravity among the upper classes of Parisian society. A perfect setting for Truffaut's alter ego, the area is photographed beautifully and becomes as integral to the film as any of the characters.

After his military discharge, Antoine needs work to pay the rent, so Christine's father hooks him up with a hotel owner and Antoine is off to a short lived career as hotel night watchman. Antoine's job comes to a crashing end when he falls victim to a private investigator's scheme to catch an adulterous wife in the act, providing a humorous moment when the flustered husband first throws flowers at his naked wife before coming to his senses and busting the vase against the wall.

In the same manner as Paris' winding streets, Antoine's firing only leads to his next job with the private detective. His first attempts at subtle spying are completely inept and funny, prompting one lady to point him out to the police as a stalker within two blocks--pretty obvious when you're half hiding your face with a newspaper and darting from place to place, staring at the woman like an obsessed stalker.

Much of the plot seems episodic, with some scenes working much better than others. Within the detective agency, there is an overwrought scene with a homosexual who begins wringing his hands unnaturally and then going berserk when he hears that his lover has just gotten married. This particular over the top scene doesn't to fit in well with other sections that show infatuated lovers and unrequited love.

More successful is a scene that shows a shop owner, so paranoid that he is convinced that none of his workers likes him. Upon further questioning, the man is sure that he has absolutely no friends at all, and is really in need of professional counseling. This sets Antoine up to work at Tobard's Shoe Shop even though his shoebox wrapping is by far the sloppiest of the five "candidates." There, he learns little beyond the typical employee gossip that the boss is a monster, and he becomes infatuated with Mrs. Tobard that sets up a scene similar to Mrs. Robinson's seduction scene in The Graduate (1967).

Stolen Kisses certainly has charm, and is more accessible to mainstream audiences than the previous Antoine films. There are touches of whimsy and melancholy as Antoine reveals to Christine that he mistakenly enlisted in the army after becoming inspired by a novel, and that he rarely wrote the last few months of his service because he was mostly in prison or in the hospital. There's also a touching "morning after" scene where Christine gently instructs Antoine how to properly butter his toast, but these scenes left me longing for more.

Another interesting scene has Antoine loudly practicing his name while looking at himself in the mirror. Is this a sign that Léaud is coming into his own, or submerging more into Truffaut's alter ego and becoming more and more like the great director? As Léaud ages, his appearance and voice seem to grow more and more like Truffaut, and he demonstrates that he knows how to improvise in front of the camera.

Stolen Kisses has wonderful location shooting and people intrigued by Antoine's troubled character illustrated in The 400 Blows and in Antoine and Colette will want to see this third episode, that plays like a non-fattening appetizer. Arthouse lovers should avoid seeing Stolen Kisses first; otherwise, they may not watch Truffaut's better films.