Truffaut's film about school children in a provincial French town, is very good but probably not a masterpiece.
The film is essentially a series of episodic stories about the children, first love, parents being mean to kids, etc. This is what is called a "gentle comedy." Small Change gets serious towards the end when it is discovered that one of the kids is being abused by his parents. Truffaut had a very troubled childhood so it's not surprising the film would advocate for children's rights.
This is a good film, however I would not call it a masterpiece like The Wild Child. Truffaut was like John Ford, he liked to work. He was always developing film projects. In reality not every film can be a masterpiece even for a great director like Truffaut.
The problem with Small Change is the lack of a strong central story for the audience to get involved in. The abused child episode is only a minor part of the film.
Still, Small Change is made with a lot of skill. Truffaut was a very good director of children, and in this film he had a lot of kids to deal with which I suspect at times must have been like herding cats.
104 minutes.
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