Luc Besson: the best films of a versatile master and their common features

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

The famous French director makes films that are completely different from each other. However, even with such varied works of Luc Besson, you can find common features.

If you do not know in advance, it is rather difficult to believe that the same person created "Leon", "Fifth Element" and "Angel-A". The director himself explains this by the fact that any film requires complete dedication and after the end of the work you want to switch to something completely different.

During the filming of "Atlantis" we had a motto: "Let's take a camera and dive a little." After filming, I couldn't talk about water for three years. Therefore, all my films are completely different - it is unbearable for me to return to the old theme.

Luc Besson

Still, one can single out some techniques that distinguish Luc Besson from other famous directors and can be traced in seemingly completely different styles of films.

Unity of opposites

Beginning with one of Besson's first full-length films, The Subway, the almost obligatory theme of the meeting and closeness of two completely dissimilar people strikes the eye. And this is not just a man and a woman. They should be the complete opposite of each other. And the brighter and more interesting their friendship and rapprochement becomes.

The girl and professional hitman in Leon, the strong but young and naive Leelu and the cynical, tired Corben Dallas in The Fifth Element, the con man and the mysterious girl in the black and white film Angel-A. Heroes simply have to be of different sexes, different ages, different characters, even different heights. And against this background, their ability to find a common language becomes a real achievement.

What to see

Leon

• Drama, crime thriller.
• France, USA, 1994.
• Duration: 110 minutes.
• IMDb: 8, 6.

The ruthless killer Leon turns out to be the only girl Matilda can rely on after the police shoot her family. A cold loner will have to find a common language with her, become attached to the girl and teach her his skills.

Angel-A

• Melodrama, comedy, noir.
• France, 2005.
• Duration: 88 minutes.
• IMDb: 7, 1.

Loser Andre, having owed the bandits a huge amount of money, decides to commit suicide. But suddenly, with him, a very beautiful girl jumps from the bridge. Andre saves her and she promises to help him with money and creditors. But who is she and did they meet by chance?

Love for nature

There are two great filmmakers who love underwater photography. This is James Cameron and Luc Besson. And if Cameron is fascinated primarily by the scale and unexplored depths, then Besson is more likely to reach for unity with nature and complete immersion in the elements.

There is a very specific explanation for this: he was born into a family of swimming instructors, spent his entire childhood on the coast and he himself was very fond of diving. But at the age of 17, Besson was injured, and doctors forbade him to dive.

The passion for the water element has not disappeared, it has only been reincarnated into cinema. In 1988, Besson released the film “The Blue Abyss” (not to be confused with “The Abyss” of the same Cameron) - partly a biographical picture about free diving champions diving to depths without air. And three years later, his documentary film Atlantis, dedicated to the inhabitants of the underwater world, was released.

Besson is concerned not only with water - the problems of the ecology of the planet and the harmful effects of man on nature can be traced in many of his films.

Even in The Fifth Element, Leelu doubted whether it was worth saving humanity after seeing what people were doing to the Earth and to each other. This theme is now reappearing in Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. But the most vividly "green" idea appears in the movie "Lucy". Here Besson, against the background of philosophical fiction and driving action, tries to convey a seemingly simple, but very important truth: man is just a part of nature, and you need to be able to find a common language with it.

What to see

Blue Abyss

• Drama, melodrama, adventure.
• France, USA, Italy, 1988.
• Duration: 132 minutes.
• IMDb: 7, 6.

A film about two friends who have become eternal competitors in diving to a depth without air. Everyone dreams of breaking an opponent's record, even at the cost of risking their lives. But in parallel with the rivalry, a love story unfolds.

Lucy

• Fantastic thriller.
• France, 2014.
• Duration: 90 minutes.
• IMDb: 6, 4.

The girl Lucy works as a drug courier and once, after an unknown substance entered her bloodstream, she realizes that her brain works much faster than that of other people. Gradually, Lucy discovers in herself almost supernatural abilities and even learns to control the forces of nature and time.

Quoting the classics

Like many contemporary directors, Luc Besson regularly quotes the classics of cinema. But if others often make remakes or copy costumes and images, then he prefers to make entire scenes directly referring to great films, often in black and white or even silent.

The ending of "Subway" almost completely copies the ending of the film "On the last breath" by Jean-Luc Godard. And not only the scene itself is repeated. Foreshortenings, duration of each frame, emotions - all one to one. And the scene of Leela's creation in The Fifth Element clearly refers to the classic film Metropolis of 1927, one of the most famous examples of cinema expressionism and futurism.

“Jeanne D'Arc” also refers in whole chunks to the classics, namely to the silent painting “The Passion of Jeanne D'Arc” by the famous Carl Theodor Dreyer. Close-ups, a combination of crosses and fire, and much more are repeated.

But the scene in the movie Malavita, where the hero of Robert De Niro watches the movie Nicefellas by Martin Scorsese, in which De Niro himself once played one of the main roles, looks especially elegant.

What to see

Joan of Arc

• Drama, biography, history.
• France, 1999.
• Duration: 160 minutes.
• IMDb: 6, 4.

The story of the famous Maid of Orleans - a devout girl who heard voices and became the commander of the French army. The emotional anguish of the main character is replaced by large-scale battle scenes.

Malavita

• Black comedy.
• France, USA, 2013.
• Duration: 111 minutes.
• IMDb: 6, 3.

The former head of the mafia moves with his family to a quiet town, where he lives under the legend of a writer collecting material for a book. But in any conflict, he is unable to restrain his temperament - and old habits take over. In addition, enemies from the past learn about the new place of residence of the family and want to get even.

Creativity for children

At the beginning of the 2000s, Luc Besson began to seriously engage in creativity for children.

The process of creating the world of "Arthur and the Miniputes" was long and rather unusual. It all started with the fact that the artist Patrice Garcia brought him several drawings with small creatures sitting on pieces of paper. Besson wrote a script about their world and wanted Garcia to make a film about it. As a result, he failed and the director took up the work himself. The process of making the film dragged on for years, therefore, to maintain interest, Besson released two books from the Arthur series based on the script in 2002, and the first film from the future series was released only in 2006.

People often say that at heart I am a child. In fact, I think I just have access to my childhood, I remember it very well. We were all children once. And this quality must be respected.

Luc Besson

The entire series of films about Arthur is a purely children's movie, without any flirting with adult humor. The filming technology is very interesting, the whole natural background is the processing of real digital photographs, but the characters themselves are computer-generated. This creates the effect of more realism of what is happening.

What to see

Arthur and miniputs

• Fantasy, adventure.
• France, USA, 2006.
• Duration: 103 minutes.
• IMDb: 6, 0.

Ten-year-old Arthur wants to help his grandmother and goes in search of treasures that are hidden in the land of miniature creatures. Having met with miniports, Arthur embarks on an adventure full of dangers and wonders.

An appeal to French comics

Often, Besson takes classic comics as the basis for his films. But not traditionally popular American ones in the world, namely those that he himself read in childhood.

The Fifth Element can be almost directly linked to the Valerian & Laureline comics. On the set of this film with Besson, the artist of this series, Jean-Claude Mezieres, worked for about six months. And visually, some images and scenes, for example a flying taxi or the hero's flight on the windowsill, one to one resemble pictures from these comics.

In 2010, Adele's Bizarre Adventures was released, also based on the popular 70s French comics by Jacques Tardy. Adele is completely different from Valerian, it is an adventure story about a journalist writer who constantly encounters supernatural beings and mystical stories.

Well, in 2017, Besson released the film Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, an adaptation of the comic book he loved as a child. For France, this is a real legend, the series was published for almost 40 years and sold around the world with a circulation of 10 million copies.

What to see

Fifth Element

• Action, adventure, fantasy.
• France, 1997.
• Duration: 126 minutes.
• IMDb: 7, 7.

A great evil is approaching the earth, threatening the destruction of the whole world. You can defeat him only by bringing together five important elements. But the fifth element turns out to be the naive girl Leelu, whom Corben Dallas, a taxi driver from New York, must help in saving the world.

Adele's Bizarre Adventures

• Adventure, fantasy.
• France, 2010.
• Duration: 105 minutes.
• IMDb: 6, 3.

The journalist Adele travels to Egypt to find an ancient mummy there. Meanwhile, in Paris, a baby pterodactyl is hatching from a prehistoric egg. Adele has her own plans for both the mummy and the professor who made this revival.

Working on scripts

If Luc Besson disappears for some time from the post of director, this does not mean at all that he abandoned cinema. Films based on his scripts are constantly being released, one might even say that this is his main occupation. It's just that sometimes Besson undertakes to shoot himself, and sometimes he gives projects to other directors. All films of the Taxi series, all three "Carriers", "Wasabi", "Crimson Rivers", "13th District" and dozens of others were shot according to his scripts.

What to see

Taxi

• Comedy, action, crime.
• France, 1998.
• Duration: 86 minutes.
• IMDb: 6, 9.

Taxi driver Daniel and policeman Emilien, who is completely unable to drive, decide to help each other and try to catch an elusive gang of bank robbers hiding from the police in Mercedes. But Daniel's taxi can catch up with even the fastest bandit.

Permanent team

Like many venerable directors, Besson loves to work with the same people. And in his case, this applies not only to the actors. For most of the films, the music is written by the same composer - Eric Serra. The cameraman is also almost always the same - the director's longtime partner Thierry Arbogast. And the fact that the same team is working on films that are so different visually and stylistically adds a lot of points to Luc Besson's talent box.

As for the actors, Jean Reno can be seen most often in Besson's paintings or in films based on his scripts. He first appeared in the very first feature-length film of the director "The Penultimate", and after that he repeatedly starred in his films, both in major and minor roles.

Recently, a new film by Luc Besson, Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, was released. For all the seeming simplicity and brightness of the plot, the release of this particular picture is an old dream of the director. As already mentioned, Besson has read these comics since childhood and has long wanted to transfer them to the screen. The first version of the script was ready 10 years ago, but at that time it was not possible to make a film of this magnitude. Now, thanks to the advancement of technology, it has appeared.

Wanting to do everything exactly the way he wants, the director even took financial risks. He again shot the most expensive non-Hollywood film (the previous one was his "Fifth Element"), but at the same time refused to cooperate with major studios, as they began to dictate their terms. And therefore in the new film there is a lot of real Besson: two heroes with opposite characters, comics, the question of protecting nature is sharply raised again. But the main thing is that many scenes and images from the comics are literally transferred to the screen one to one.