At the age of 88: actor Jean-Paul Belmondo has died

The French film and theater actor Jean-Paul Belmondo is dead. As his lawyer announced, Belmondo died in Paris at the age of 88.

The French actor Jean-Paul Belmondo has died at the age of 88. Belmondo died in Paris, as his lawyer Michel Godest announced.

Belmondo’s career spanned half a century. He became one of the most famous actors in France, starred in more than 80 films and worked with a variety of important French directors, from Francois Truffaut to Claude Lelouch.

Weakened since stroke

He had been physically weakened since a stroke in 2001. “He’s been very tired for a while,” said his lawyer. “He died calmly.”

Belmondo, known as “Bébel” by his French fans, was best known as an antihero. In numerous works he played daredevils and gangsters. In the 1960s he was seen as the figurehead of “Nouvelle Vague” cinema and a symbol of rebellion and anarchism. He was part of a new generation of movie stars who were no longer beautiful heroes.

He celebrated his breakthrough to a cinema star at the age of 26 with Jean-Luc Godard’s “Out of Breath”. Later they shot the love triangle “A woman is a woman” together. One of the biggest box office hits with Belmondo is “Adventure in Rio” by Philippe de Broca about a young soldier looking for his kidnapped girlfriend.