Jean-Pierre Jeunet

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Born 3 September 1953 (1953-09-03) (age 58)
Roanne, Loire, France
Occupation Filmmaker
Spouse Liza Sullivan

Jean-Pierre Jeunet (French pronunciation: [ʒɑ̃ pjɛʁ ʒœnɛ]; born 3 September 1953) is a French film director.

Contents

[edit] Life and career

Jean-Pierre Jeunet was born in Roanne, Loire, France. He bought his first camera at the age of 17 and made short films while studying animation at Cinémation Studios. He befriended Marc Caro, a designer and comic book artist who became his longtime collaborator and co-director.

Together, Jeunet and Caro directed award-winning animations. Their first live action film was The Bunker of the Last Gunshots (1981), a short film about soldiers in a bleak futuristic world. Jeunet also directed numerous advertisements and music videos, such as Jean Michel Jarre's Zoolook (together with Caro).

Jeunet and Caro's first feature film was Delicatessen (1991), a black comedy set in a famine-plagued post-apocalyptic world, in which an apartment building above a delicatessen is ruled by a butcher who kills people in order to feed his tenants.

They next made The City of Lost Children (1995), a dark, multi-layered fantasy film about a mad scientist who kidnaps children in order to steal their dreams thus preventing him from aging prematurely.

The success of The City of Lost Children led to an invitation to direct the fourth movie in the Alien series–Alien Resurrection (1997). Like his subsequent films, this one is credited only to Jeunet, although Caro did some work on the art design.[citation needed]

Jeunet returned to France. The clout of having a Hollywood film under his belt gave him free rein on his next project,[original research?] Amélie, starring Audrey Tautou. Amélie diverges in tone from his earlier films, as it has romantic and comedic elements and lacks his previous films' dark mise-en-scene. This change is sometimes attributed[by whom?] to Caro's minimal participation.[citation needed] This story, about a woman who takes pleasure in doing good deeds but cannot find love herself, was a huge critical and commercial success worldwide and was nominated for several Academy Awards. For this film, Jeunet also gained a European Film Award for Best Director.

In 2004, Jeunet released A Very Long Engagement, an adaptation of the novel by Sébastien Japrisot. The film, starring Audrey Tautou, chronicled a woman's search for her missing lover after World War I.

In 2006 Jeunet rejected an offer to direct Harry Potter and the Order of Phoenix.

In 2007, Jeunet pulled out of directing Yann Martel's novel Life of Pi for budgetary reasons.

In 2009 he released Micmacs à tire-larigot.

Jeunet has also directed numerous commercials including a 2'25" film for Chanel N° 5 featuring his frequently used actress Audrey Tautou.

  • NEW MOVIE UPDATE*

According to the official site of Jeunet, financing is in place for his next project: "TS Spivet”. The adaptation of Reif Larsen’s book: “The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet. The film is to be shot in English on location in Canada and the US- in 3D for a release in 2013.

[edit] Filmography

no

Year Film Director Writer
1991 Delicatessen Yes Yes
1995 The City of Lost Children Yes Yes
1997 Alien Resurrection Yes No
2001 Amélie Yes Yes
2004 A Very Long Engagement Yes Yes
2009 Micmacs Yes Yes

[edit] Collaborations

Delicatessen The City of
Lost Children
Alien
Resurrection
Amélie A Very Long
Engagement
Micmacs
Marc Caro
NoN
NoN
Jean-Claude Dreyfus
NoN
NoN
NoN
André Dussollier
NoN
NoN
NoN
Ticky Holgado
NoN
NoN
NoN
NoN
Mathieu Kassovitz
NoN
NoN
Yolande Moreau
NoN
NoN
Ron Perlman
NoN
NoN
Dominique Pinon
NoN
NoN
NoN
NoN
NoN
NoN
Rufus
NoN
NoN
NoN
Audrey Tautou
NoN
NoN

[edit] External links

Personal tools
Namespaces

Variants
Actions
Navigation
Interaction
Toolbox
Print/export
Languages