Jean-Jacques Beineix

Born in Paris in 1946, French director Jean-Jacques Beineix came to preeminence with his first film, Diva, released in 1981. Two years later, his second was the critically panned Moon in the Gutter, starring Gérard Depardieu, Nastassja Kinski, and Victoria Abril, an adaptation of a novel by crime writer David Goodis. He achieved what would be the greatest success of his career in 1986 with Betty Blue which was nominated as Best Foreign Film for the Golden Globes and the Academy Awards the following year.

His next features were disappointments, both critically and at the box-office. Roselyne and the Lions, (1989), IP5: The Island of Pachyderms (1992) and his last one, Mortal Transfer (2001). The latter leaving him in quasi financial ruin. In the next twenty years, Beineix directed a few documentaries and a play, Kiki of Montparnasse. He published the first volume of his autobiography in 2006. He died in Paris, on January 13, 2022 after a long illness.