Luc Besson

Luc Besson is a French director, screenwriter and producer whose films include Subway, The Big Blue, Nikita, Léon and The Fifth Element. He learned filmmaking through work as an assistant before directing the short L'Avant Dernier and expanding it into his first feature, Le Dernier Combat (1983).

Jean Reno became a recurring collaborator, appearing in that early work and starring in Léon (1994), an English-language thriller also featuring Natalie Portman and Gary Oldman. Besson's work has crossed between French cinema and international commercial filmmaking. He also directed music videos for Isabelle Adjani and Serge Gainsbourg and chaired the Cannes feature-film jury in 2000.