French director Laurent Cantet died this Thursday, April 25 at the age of 63, his agent announced to AFP (confirming information from Libération): “ He died this morning in Paris of illness.”
It was in 2000 that Laurent Cantet released his first film at the cinema, Human ressources. A feature film which received two awards at the César ceremony in 2001: César for best first work and César for best male hopeful for Jalil Lespert. After this first critical success, this committed, human-centered filmmaker directed The timetable (2001) with Karin Viard or even To the south with Charlotte Rampling (2005).
In 2008, the time was consecration for Laurent Cantet, winner of the prestigious Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, for his fourth feature film, Between the walls. A prize which created a surprise, awarded “ unanimously » by the Cannes jury chaired that year by Sean Penn. “A palm for humanity, an extraordinary film”declared the American actor, moved, when presenting the prize, as recalled by Télérama. Adapted from the eponymous novel by François Bégaudeau, Between the walls – inspired by the writer’s own story, who plays the main role in the film – follows a young French teacher in a college known for being difficult.
A new film due to be released in 2025
After this Palme d’Or – which rewarded France for the first time since 1987 and Under Satan’s Sun by Maurice Pialat, Laurent Cantet had released Foxfire (2012) based on a novel by Joyce Carol Oates, Return to Ithaca (2014) or more recently The Workshop (2017) with Marina Foïs and Arthur Rambo (2022), inspired by the Mehdi Meklat affair. According to AFP, he was preparing a new film, The apprenticewhich was scheduled for release in 2025.
