Paris (AFP)

Eminent personality of French cinema, artist committed to eclectic work and recognized abroad, Bertrand Tavernier has successfully directed period and contemporary films, with a predilection for societal subjects.

He was also a great cinephile invested in the preservation and transmission of films, driven both by the desire to defend independent French cinema and the passion for American cinema of the 20th century.

His films have been widely rewarded: 74 Louis-Delluc prize for "The watchmaker of Saint-Paul", Oscar nomination 83 for "Coup de torchon", prize for directing in Cannes in 1984 for "Un dimanche à la campaign ", BAFTA 90 for Best Foreign Film for" Life and Nothing Else ", Golden Bear 95 in Berlin for" The Bait ", Golden Lion in Venice for Lifetime Achievement.

In France, this cinema madman, imposing stature and generous hair bleached over the years, scriptwriter of his own films, received five Césars (including those for best director in 1976 for "Let the party begin" and in 1997 for "Captain Conan ") and his films were nominated about fifteen times.

He was also owed "The judge and the murderer" (1976), "A week's vacation" (1980), "Around midnight" (Oscar for best music in 87), "L.627" (1992), "D'Artagnan's daughter" (1994), "In the electric mist" (2009), "The princess of Montpensier" (2010) or "Quai d'Orsay" (2013).

Police, political, historical, adventure, war films ...: in total, a work tinged with seriousness and secret emotions, at war against injustices, racism, drugs or unemployment, marked by taste storytelling and characters, the very ones rejected by the New Wave.

Its goal was "to explore and tame eras and universes through characters taken in affection" and with complicated destinies.

"Not to be bored, it's a matter of politeness!", He added, emphasizing his "physical pleasure" to be on the sets, to direct the actors.

Like his friend, his "brother", Philippe Noiret, with whom he shot six films.

- Fan of westerns -

Bertrand Tavernier was born on April 25, 1941 in Lyon, a high place of cinema with the Institut Lumière, of which he was president.

"Lyon taught me to take root in a place. I am provincial and happy to be it, I do not feel Parisian", he said.

Son of the writer and resistance fighter René Tavernier, he discovered the cinema during a stay in a sanatorium.

Having moved to Paris, he founded the NickelOdéon film club with friends and collaborated in the 1960s on various reviews.

Assistant on "Léon Morin, prêtre" by Jean-Pierre Melville, he became press secretary for films by Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Chabrol or Georges de Beauregard, the producer of the New Wave.

In 1970, he co-authored a book that would become a reference: "30 years of American cinema" (reissued and updated).

He also publishes interviews with great Hollywood authors (1994).

He claimed to have become a director "because of his admiration for westerns".

In his films or on the sidelines of his work as a filmmaker, Bertrand Tavernier was involved in numerous fights: against censorship, against torture during the Algerian war (he had made a documentary on this conflict, "La guerre sans nom "), in favor of undocumented migrants, for the rediscovery of forgotten screenwriters, for the defense of European cinema against the commercialism of American cinema.

"I am no more jaded now than when I started," he assured in 2016 by presenting his documentary "Journey through French cinema", a very personal story of the 7th art, made possible by watching hundreds of films .

These artists "are people who feed me in different ways. What's beautiful is the variety of approaches. I try to argue for that. It's anti-formatting," he explained.

With screenwriter Colo Tavernier (deceased in 2020) from whom he was divorced, Bertrand Tavernier had two children: Nils, actor and director, and Tiffany, writer.

With the latter, he shot the film "Holy Lola" (2004) on adoption in Cambodia.

He remarried to screenwriter Sarah Thibau in 2005.

© 2021 AFP