It is with deep regret that we report the death of iconic French actor Alain Delon at the age of 88.
Delon — star of Le Samourai, Plein Soleil, Rocco And His Brothers, and much, much more — brought an insouciant cool to cinema on- and off-screen, as well as an ineffable ability to convey the depths of a brooding soul in the level of those self-same eyes. Delon died on August 18 at his house in Douchy, accompanied by his three children and family.
Alain Fabien Maurice Marcel Delon was born on November 8, 1935, to François Fabien Delon, a cinema projectionist (and later La Régina cinema director), and Édith Marie Suzanne Arnold, a pharmacist and cinema usher. After a difficult childhood filled with school expulsions, prison stints, and gang involvements, Delon’s fortunes changed at the Cannes Film Festival in 1957, when he was recognized by David O. Selznick’s talent agent Henry Wilson and offered a trial as an actor in Rome. The rest, as they say, is history.
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Following successful early romantic lead roles in Pierre Gaspard-Huit’s Christine and Michel Boisrond’s Weak Women and Way Of Youth, Delon’s stardom was cemented in 1960 with a one-two punch of striking leading roles in René Clément’s Plein Soleil (Purple Noon) and Luchino Visconti’s Rocco And His Brothers. In The Talented Mr. Ripley, the first film adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s cat-and-mouse thriller, Delon cleverly subverted his preternatural good looks as sociopathic social climber Tom Ripley, demonstrating to the world that those angular cheekbones were far from the only sharp edge the Frenchman possessed with a mercurial, ice-cool performance. In the latter, a devastating work of Italian neorealism by filmmaking maestro Visconti, Delon appears to have drawn on his own troubled upbringing to play Rocco, the focal point among five siblings all battling following their father’s death.
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Delon’s star would continue to shine in a series of auteur-driven films, including Michelangelo Antonioni’s smouldering romantic drama L’Eclisse, Visconti’s historical epic The Leopard, and — perhaps most famously — Jean-Pierre Melville’s Uber-stylized 1967 neo-noir crime thriller Le Samourai, in which Delon is utterly magnetic as sharply dressed assassin Jef Costello. These monolithic works of 20th century European cinema were joined by further eye-catching turns from Delon — who starred in 90 films over the course of a career spanning over half a century — in such films as Marianne Faithfull co-starrer Girl On A Motorcycle, La Piscine (which would later be remade by Luca Guadagnino in the form of A Bigger Splash), César award-winner Monsieur Klein, and Jean-Luc Godard’s Nouvelle Vague. Even after formally retiring from acting in 1997, Delon couldn’t resist returning to the cinematic canvas a decade later, playing Julius Caesar in the 2008 live-action French family film Asterix At The Olympic Games, one of the increasingly reclusive star’s final screen appearances.
Despite recent illness, additional familial turmoil, and career-long controversies that have persisted well into his twilight years, Delon — one of the most truly iconic figures, faces, and characters of cinema’s first full century — had a true full-circle moment at the Cannes Film Festival in 2019, when the Frenchman was awarded the festival’s prestigious Palme D’Honneur. Delon acknowledged his medal as a posthumous honor delivered while he was still alive, saying, “I am going to leave, but I won’t leave without thanking you.” We are grateful for the films, characters, and cinematic legacy Delon has left behind.
Conman, hitman, lover, fighter—whatever and anyone he played, we can all agree that Alain Delon played them better than anybody else. Our sympathies are with his friends and family during this difficult time.
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