Mathieu Kassovitz
Kassovitz at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival
Born (1967-08-03) 3 August 1967
NationalityFrench
OccupationActor • film director • film producer • screenwriter
Years active1978–present
SpouseJulie Mauduech
Websitewww.mathieukassovitz.com (Archived)

Mathieu Kassovitz (French pronunciation: [matjø kasɔvits]; born 3 August 1967) is a French actor, film director, film producer and screenwriter. He has won three César Awards: Most Promising Actor for See How They Fall (1994), and Best Film and Best Editing for La Haine (1995). He also received Best Director and Best Writing nominations.

Early life

He is the son of Peter Kassovitz, a film producer, director and writer, and Chantal Rémy, a film editor.[1] His mother is a French Catholic, while his father is a Hungarian Jew who fled during the Hungarian Revolution of 1956.[2] Mathieu has described himself as "not Jewish but I was brought up in a world of Jewish humor".[2]

Career

Filmmaker

As a filmmaker, Kassovitz has made several artistic and commercial successes. He wrote and directed La Haine (Hate, 1995), a film dealing with themes around class, race, violence, and police brutality.[3] The film won the César Award for Best Film and netted Kassovitz the Best Director prize at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival.[4]

He later directed Les Rivières Pourpres (2000), a police detective thriller starring Jean Reno and Vincent Cassel, another massive commercial success in France, and Gothika (2003), a fantasy thriller (considered by some to be a commercial failure, although it grossed over three times its roughly $40 million budget), with Halle Berry and Penélope Cruz. He used the money he made from Gothika to develop a far more personal project Babylon Babies, the adaptation of one of Maurice Dantec's books.[1] Kassovitz established the film production firm MNP Entreprise in 2000 "to develop and produce feature films by Kassovitz and to represent him as a director and actor."[5] MNP Entreprise is responsible for the co-productions of a number of films including Avida (2006) in which Kassovitz acts and Babylon A.D. which he directed. Kassovitz purchased the film rights for the novel Johnny Mad Dog by Congolese writer Emmanuel Dongala. The film was also co-produced by MNP Entreprise, and directed by Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire. The premiere of the film was made at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival where it was screened within the Un Certain Regard section.[6]

In 2011, he starred in and directed Rebellion, a war film based on a true story of French commandos who clashed with tribes in New Caledonia, the Melanesian territory of France. His future project science fiction film MNP is named after Mir Space Station, whose writing in Cyrillic letters (Мир) look like the letters MNP, and also the production company.[7]

Actor

Kassovitz at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival

Kassovitz is most famous outside France for his acting role as Nino Quincampoix in Jean-Pierre Jeunet's film Amélie. He also had small roles in La Haine (which he also directed), Birthday Girl, and The Fifth Element. He played leading roles in A Self-Made Hero (1996) by Jacques Audiard and in Amen. (2003) by Costa-Gavras. Kassovitz is also recognizable for playing a conflicted Belgian explosives expert in Steven Spielberg's 2005 film Munich, alongside Eric Bana and Geoffrey Rush. Kassovitz was a jury member for the 2001 Cannes Film Festival.

Since 2015, Kassovitz has been starring in the acclaimed espionage thriller series The Bureau, broadcast in France on Canal+ and made available around the world on Amazon TV. So far five seasons have been screened.

Personal life

Kassovitz was married to French actress Julie Mauduech, whom he directed and acted alongside in his 1993 film Métisse (Café au lait, English title) and who made a brief appearance in La Haine (during the scene in the Parisian art gallery).[8][9]

In 2009, Kassovitz won with a Tesla Roadster (2008) the Rallye Monte Carlo des Véhicules à Énergie Alternative (starting event of the FIA Alternative Energies Cup) in the category reserved to electric vehicles.[10][11]

Kassovitz is also known for his outspokenness, frequently making controversial comments on socio-political issues. Kassovitz was an ardent critic of former president Nicolas Sarkozy, whom he described in his blog as having "ideas that not only reveal his inexperience of politics and human relations, but which also illuminate the purely demagogical and egocentric aspects of a puny, would-be Napoleon."[12] In a 2012 interview, he labeled the outgoing Sarkozy administration as "horrible".[13]

On 3 September 2023, while engaged in a training course at the Autodrome de Montlhéry, Kassovitz was involved in a "serious" motorcycle accident that caused head trauma and a fractured pelvis.[14][15]

Filmography

Short film

Year Title Director Writer Actor Notes
1990 Fierrot le pou Yes Yes Yes
1991 Cauchemar Blanc Yes Yes
1992 Assassins... Yes Yes Yes
1994 Elle voulait faire quelque chose Yes Role: Mathieu
Avant mais après Yes
Putain de porte Yes
1995 Les Fleurs de Maria Papadopylou Yes
1996 La Forêt Yes Documentary short;
Segment of Lumières sur un massacre
1998 Article Premier Yes

Producer

  • La Chepor (2004)

Feature film

Kassovitz at the preview of Rebellion, 2011
Year Title Director Writer Producer Editor Notes
1993 Métisse Yes Yes
1995 La Haine Yes Yes Yes
1997 Assassin(s) Yes Yes Yes
2000 The Crimson Rivers Yes Yes
2003 Gothika Yes
2005 Nèg Maron Yes
2006 White Palms Yes
Avida Yes
2007 Les Deux Mondes Yes
2008 Enfants de Don Quichotte (Acte 1) Yes Documentary
Johnny Mad Dog Yes
Babylon A.D. Yes Yes Yes
Louise Hires a Contract Killer Yes
2011 Rebellion Yes Yes Yes Yes

Acting roles

Year Title Role Notes
1979 Au bout du bout du banc Mathias Oppenheim
1981 Next Year If All Goes Well A boy
1992 Un été sans histoires A hitchhiker
Métisse Felix
1994 See How They Fall Johnny
1995 The City of Lost Children Man on the street Uncredited
La Haine Young Skinhead
1996 My Man 1st Client: Clément Uncredited
A Self-Made Hero Albert Dehousse
News from the Good Lord A nurse
1997 The Fifth Element Mugger
Assassin(s) Max
1998 Pleasure (And Its Little Inconveniences) Roland
1999 Jakob the Liar Herschel
2001 Amélie Nino Quincampoix
Birthday Girl Yuri
2002 Asterix & Obelix: Mission Cleopatra Physionomiste banquet
Amen. Riccardo Fontana
2005 Munich Robert
2006 Avida The producer
2008 Louise Hires a Contract Killer The farm owner
2011 Rebellion Philippe Legorjus
Haywire Studer
2012 Another Woman's Life Paul Speranski
Le Guetteur Vincent Kaminski
2013 Angélique Nicolas / Calembredaine
2014 Nobody from Nowhere Sébastien Nicolas / Henri de Montalte
Wild Life Paco (Philippe Fournier)
2016 Le Gang des Antillais Bar owner
Apocalypse Verdun Voice-over Documentary
2017 Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets Camelot on Big Market
Happy End Thomas Laurent
Sparring Steve Landry
De plus belle
2019 The Wolf's Call ALFOST[lower-alpha 1]
2021 The Accusation Adam
2023 Visions Guillaume

Television

Acting roles

Year Title Role Notes
1978 Médecins de nuit
1983 La Vie de Berlioz Young Berlioz Mini-series
1992 Touch and Die Piaz TV movie
1994 3000 scénarios contre un virus
2015–2020 The Bureau Malotru
2016 War & Peace Napoléon Bonaparte

Awards and nominations

Cannes Film Festival

Year Title Award Result
1991 Cauchemar Blanc Perspectives du Cinéma Award Won
1995 La Haine Best Director Won
Palme d'Or Nominated
1997 Assassin(s) Nominated

César Awards

Year Title Award Result
1992 Métisse Most Promising Actor Nominated
1994 See How They Fall Won
1993 Métisse Best First Feature Film Nominated
1995 La Haine Best Film Won
Best Director Nominated
Best Writing Nominated
Best Editing Won
2000 The Crimson Rivers Best Director Nominated
2002 Amen. Best Actor Nominated
2011 Rebellion Best Adaptation Nominated

European Film Awards

Year Title Award Result
1995 La Haine Best Film Nominated
European Discovery of the Year Won
2000 The Crimson Rivers Academy Lux Award Nominated

Lumières Award

Year Title Award Result
1995 La Haine Best Film Won
Best Director Nominated
2014 Wild Life Best Actor Nominated

Other awards

Year Award Category Title Result
1991 Chicago International Film Festival Best Short film Cauchemar Blanc Won
1993 Festival du Film de Paris Special Jury Prize Métisse Won
2000 San Sebastián International Film Festival Golden Shell The Crimson Rivers Nominated
2001 Cabourg Film Festival Best Actor Amélie Won
2015 ACS Awards Best Actor The Bureau Won
2019 Nominated

Notes

  1. "ALFOST" is not a name. It is an acronym designating the admiral commanding the SSBN fleet of the French Navy. It stands for AmiraL commandant la Force Océanique STratégique (Admiral commanding the Strategic Oceanic Force)

References

  1. 1 2 "Mathieu Kassovitz profile". Voice.fr. Retrieved 1 January 2015.
  2. 1 2 Riding, Alan (14 August 1994). "A French Director Straight Out of (Enfin) Spike Lee". The New York Times. Retrieved 26 November 2007.
  3. France.html Presentation of the documentary A Film and Its Era: La Haine
  4. "Festival de Cannes: La Haine". festival-cannes.com. Retrieved 4 September 2009.
  5. "MNP Entreprise". En.unifrance.org. Retrieved 8 August 2012.
  6. "Festival de Cannes: Film details 2008". Festival-cannes.fr. Retrieved 8 August 2012.
  7. Leffler, Rebecca (21 May 2008). "Kassovitz leading 'Rebellion', big-budget 'MNP'". The Hollywood Reporter, the Daily from Cannes. Cannes (8): 22. Retrieved 6 August 2015.
  8. "Mathieu Kassovitz: Biographie". LeJournal des Femmes (in French).
  9. "La biographie de Mathieu Kassovitz avec Voici.fr". Voici.fr (in French). Retrieved 6 August 2015.
  10. Classement final officiel 2009, ACM.mc; accessed 6 August 2015.
  11. (in French) un-vehicule-electrique-parcourt-390-kilometres.html Nouveau record du monde: un véhicule électrique parcourt 390 kilomètres, World Sports Events; accessed 6 August 2015.
  12. "La haine: Kassovitz vs. Sarkozy - From the Current - The Criterion Collection". Criterion.com. 16 April 2007. Retrieved 6 August 2015.
  13. "Hungarians are crazy", Index.hu, 30 May 2012.
  14. Piña, Christy (3 September 2023). "French Director and Actor Mathieu Kassovitz Involved in "Serious" Motorcycle Accident". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
  15. Chrisafis, Angelique (4 September 2023). "French actor Mathieu Kassovitz 'seriously injured' in motorbike accident". The Guardian. Paris. Agence France-Presse. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
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