Leos Carax

Director · Cast · Writer

Born

November 22, 1960 · Suresnes, Seine [now Hauts-de-Seine], France

Birth name

Alexandre Oscar Dupont

"A movie is always a private experience that becomes public, whether it is fiction or not". Leos Carax, the enigmatic poet of French cinema, is a director who pushes visual intensity to its limit with meticulous shots and dramatic travellings, turning the camera into another character in his stories. Born as Alexandre Oscar Dupont in 1960, he reinvented himself under the name Leos Carax, an anagram of his real name that reflects his passion for experimentation and his search for identity. From Boy Meets Girl (1984) to Bad Blood (1986) to The Lovers of Pont-Neuf (1991), his work makes the "outsider" the center of the narrative, exploring loneliness and love through tormented and obsessive characters in constant movement, mostly played by Denis Lavant, his frequent collaborator. His cinema, a hybrid between music and visuals, defies expectations and explores a love that borders on the impossible, as in his musical Annette (2021), for which he won the Cannes Award for Best Director. A lover of risk and melancholic narrative, Carax redefines the limits of cinema, leaving an emotional imprint that does not seek to be understood, but to be felt. He understands cinema as a space for the spectator and for self-confession, where everyones is a different person each time a movie is made.