Anne Parillaud
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Biography
Svelte French beauty Anne Parillaud made her film debut in "L'Hotel de la Plage" (1978) while still in her teens and appeared in several more European movies before aligning herself both on and off the screen with French auteur Alain Delon, acting in his crime dramas ("Pour la Peau d'un flic" 1981 and "Le Battant" 1983). She broke through to international stardom as the punk junkie transformed into a murderous, stylish secret agent in "La Femme Nikita" (1990), the role written for her by Luc Besson, the film's director and Parillaud's companion for several years. When "Nikita" became an art-house hit in the USA, a move to American features was inevitable.
Parillaud's first Hollywood film was John Landis' "Innocent Blood" (1992), a violent horror comedy co-starring Anthony LaPaglia, in which she approached her role as a lonely vampire with admirable empathy and conviction. This clever and savvy genre film, however, failed with critics and at the box office. Her next credit was an ambitious international co-production, Vincent Ward's "Map of the Human Heart" (1993), wherein Parillaud portrayed a young Metis (half-Quebec French, half-Indian) whose love of a half-breed Inuit (Jason Scott Lee) conflicts with her desire to fully join the white world.
Parillaud returned to Europe, where she continued to be very picky about roles, refusing to do anything for commerce alone, waiting for projects that touched her heart as well. She starred opposite Beatrice Dalle in the French sibling rivalry drama "A la Folie/Six Days, Six Nights" (1994) and portrayed a WWII refugee from France loved by Matt Dillon and Gabriel Byrne in "Frankie Starlight" (1995). After acting in "Passage a l'acte/Death in Therapy" (1996), a cautionary tale of the perils of the psychiatrist's couch for the analyst and the analysand, she appeared in her most mainstream movie yet, playing Queen Anne in Randall Wallace's directorial debut, "The Man in the Iron Mask" (1998), starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Gabriel Byrne.
Filmography
Cast (Feature Film)
Life Events
1977
Feature acting debut, "L'Hotel de la Plage"
1981
First of two films with auteur-lover Alain Delon, "Pour la Peau d'un Flic/For a Cop's Hide"
1983
Reteamed with Delon in "Le Battant/The Cache"
1985
Played Jeanne Moreau's daughter in "Intoxe" on Paris stage (date approximate)
1990
Breakthrough role, "La Femme Nikita"; first film with Moreau
1992
American acting debut, John Landis' "Innocent Blood"
1993
Portrayed a young Metis (half-Quebec Franch, half-Indian) in Vincent Ward's "Map of the Human Heart"; Moreau contributed a cameo
1994
Starred opposite Beatrice Dalle in "Six Days, Six Nights"
1995
Acted in "Frankie Starlight", portraying a WWII French refugee loved by Matt Dllon and Gabriel Byrne
1998
Played Queen Anne in "Man in the Iron Mask"; film reunited her with Byrne (who played D'Artagnan)
1998
Played dual role in Raul Ruiz's "Shattered Image"
2004
Starred as a director struggling with a difficult sex scene between two actors who can't stand each other in Catherine Breillat's "Sex is Comedy"
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