The Prague Post - Anouk Aimee, 60s icon of French elegance, dies at 92

EUR -
AED 4.177115
AFN 81.881407
ALL 99.252011
AMD 444.59148
ANG 2.049629
AOA 1037.159602
ARS 1294.14051
AUD 1.780172
AWG 2.047025
AZN 1.937816
BAM 1.956825
BBD 2.294803
BDT 138.092365
BGN 1.957857
BHD 0.428625
BIF 3332.101328
BMD 1.137236
BND 1.492134
BOB 7.854392
BRL 6.605299
BSD 1.136596
BTN 97.022843
BWP 15.66621
BYN 3.71968
BYR 22289.824581
BZD 2.282996
CAD 1.574122
CDF 3271.828234
CHF 0.930817
CLF 0.028662
CLP 1099.88957
CNY 8.306268
CNH 8.306019
COP 4901.486936
CRC 571.199327
CUC 1.137236
CUP 30.136753
CVE 110.77121
CZK 25.063093
DJF 202.11002
DKK 7.466603
DOP 68.807192
DZD 150.758867
EGP 58.143353
ERN 17.058539
ETB 151.279275
FJD 2.59711
FKP 0.856519
GBP 0.857288
GEL 3.116471
GGP 0.856519
GHS 17.695835
GIP 0.856519
GMD 81.31675
GNF 9843.350125
GTQ 8.754588
GYD 238.429138
HKD 8.827817
HNL 29.46444
HRK 7.519522
HTG 148.317723
HUF 408.38716
IDR 19177.096068
ILS 4.189521
IMP 0.856519
INR 97.094367
IQD 1489.779092
IRR 47906.064711
ISK 145.100373
JEP 0.856519
JMD 179.644139
JOD 0.806646
JPY 161.682017
KES 147.276378
KGS 99.205077
KHR 4566.00273
KMF 492.996098
KPW 1023.486197
KRW 1613.044532
KWD 0.348711
KYD 0.947196
KZT 594.971784
LAK 24598.413953
LBP 101896.34134
LKR 339.937138
LRD 227.418803
LSL 21.444738
LTL 3.357963
LVL 0.687903
LYD 6.221113
MAD 10.547908
MDL 19.662304
MGA 5177.713287
MKD 61.514233
MMK 2387.750039
MNT 4034.978004
MOP 9.086962
MRU 44.847502
MUR 51.278399
MVR 17.517685
MWK 1974.241998
MXN 22.428272
MYR 5.012372
MZN 72.675107
NAD 21.444738
NGN 1824.926761
NIO 41.821916
NOK 11.919455
NPR 155.236349
NZD 1.916394
OMR 0.437833
PAB 1.136596
PEN 4.279463
PGK 4.700463
PHP 64.495498
PKR 319.112616
PLN 4.278742
PYG 9097.767521
QAR 4.140226
RON 4.978937
RSD 117.291464
RUB 93.451578
RWF 1609.188866
SAR 4.267179
SBD 9.516785
SCR 16.196165
SDG 682.914367
SEK 10.955779
SGD 1.490626
SHP 0.893689
SLE 25.900592
SLL 23847.250746
SOS 649.934509
SRD 42.248737
STD 23538.488054
SVC 9.945212
SYP 14785.985057
SZL 21.403201
THB 37.92345
TJS 12.206811
TMT 3.980326
TND 3.398104
TOP 2.663525
TRY 43.355779
TTD 7.712041
TWD 36.987505
TZS 3056.325739
UAH 47.101683
UGX 4166.329832
USD 1.137236
UYU 47.664978
UZS 14768.739292
VES 91.955341
VND 29420.293975
VUV 138.058823
WST 3.166177
XAF 656.312471
XAG 0.034866
XAU 0.000342
XCD 3.073437
XDR 0.816192
XOF 653.911048
XPF 119.331742
YER 278.907529
ZAR 21.425938
ZMK 10236.492294
ZMW 32.36396
ZWL 366.189511
  • JRI

    0.1600

    12.4

    +1.29%

  • SCS

    0.0500

    9.76

    +0.51%

  • BCE

    0.4200

    22.04

    +1.91%

  • GSK

    0.5600

    35.93

    +1.56%

  • CMSD

    0.0400

    21.96

    +0.18%

  • BCC

    0.7800

    93.47

    +0.83%

  • RBGPF

    63.5900

    63.59

    +100%

  • NGG

    0.6300

    72.11

    +0.87%

  • RIO

    1.0100

    58.17

    +1.74%

  • AZN

    0.5400

    67.59

    +0.8%

  • VOD

    0.1400

    9.31

    +1.5%

  • BTI

    0.5400

    42.37

    +1.27%

  • CMSC

    0.0400

    21.82

    +0.18%

  • BP

    0.6600

    28.32

    +2.33%

  • RYCEF

    -0.1400

    9.36

    -1.5%

  • RELX

    1.0000

    52.2

    +1.92%

Anouk Aimee, 60s icon of French elegance, dies at 92
Anouk Aimee, 60s icon of French elegance, dies at 92 / Photo: Sébastien BERDA - AFP/File

Anouk Aimee, 60s icon of French elegance, dies at 92

French star Anouk Aimee, who died on Tuesday aged 92, cast a spell over a generation of film-goers with her doomed romance in Claude Lelouch's box-office smash "A Man and A Woman".

Text size:

Her role as a lovelorn widow in the 1966 film famous for its "chabadabada, chabadabada" theme tune won her an Oscar nomination, a Golden Globe for best actress and her entry into Hollywood.

Aimee's elegant sophistication had already made her a star of such European masterpieces as Federico Fellini's "La Dolce Vita" (1960) and "8 1/2" (1963), and she was unforgettable as the ageing showgirl in Jacques Demy's heartbreaking musical "Lola" (1961).

Fellini in particular revered her, saying her "face has the same intriguing sensuality as that of (Greta) Garbo, (Marlene) Dietrich or (Cindy) Crawford, these great mysterious queens, these priestesses of femininity.

"Anouk Aimee represents the kind of woman who worries you to death," he said.

That combination of "melancholy and passion" marked much of her remarkable career, with the American director Robert Altman bringing her out of retirement to rekindle her old spark with Marcello Mastroianni in the acclaimed "Pret a Porter" in 1994.

- Fleeing Nazis -

Born Francoise Dreyfus in Paris on April 27, 1932, Aimee was the scion of a theatrical family.

Her life was turned upside down when German troops marched into the city when she was eight. Her father was Jewish, putting the family in mortal danger, even though she was raised a Catholic.

"We moved all the time. We hid... But then the Germans turned up and took over the apartment downstairs," she recalled.

The family sent her to the countryside where they hoped she would be safer, changing her name so she would not have to wear a yellow star.

Her lifelong love of animals was born from the comfort they gave her during her time in hiding, she later said.

The war over, her career began at the age of 13 when she was picked from the street to play in a Marcel Carne film that was never finished for lack of money.

- The 'birth' of Anouk -

She finally made her screen debut the following year and adopted her character's name, Anouk, as her own. It would become popular in France thanks to her.

It was French poet and screenwriter Jacques Prevert who convinced her to also change her surname to Aimee, meaning "loved".

Her career took off in 1949 with Andre Cayatte's "The Lovers of Verona". Her class and beauty brought her a string of roles including in "Montparnasse 19" by Jacques Becker before she began to work with Demy and Fellini.

The massive success of "A Man and a Woman" opened the door to Hollywood, where Aimee played opposite Omar Sharif in Sidney Lumet's "The Appointment" and George Cukor's "Justine" in 1969.

But she stopped working for seven years after she married British actor Albert Finney -- her fourth husband -- in 1970. They divorced eight years later.

"Cinema is like a meeting between lovers," Aimee told AFP. "I love that, it's like a gift and I adore the feeling of being loved."

- Lovers -

Romance and juggling lovers was something of an art with Aimee, and she carried it off with her trademark elegance.

She had a string of affairs, most notably with Omar Sharif, Warren Beatty and the much younger director Elie Chouraqui -- with whom she made a number of films -- as well as the writers Jean Genet and Jean Cocteau, who were both bisexual.

"She is never so happy as when she is miserable between love affairs," said the British actor and wit Dirk Bogarde, who knew her since she was 15.

Although by the 1980s she was appearing in fewer films, she won best actress at the Cannes Film Festival in 1980 for Marco Bellocchio's "A Leap in the Dark".

In 2002 she was awarded an honorary Cesar -- France's Oscars -- and Cannes paid tribute to her four years later.

She walked the festival's red carpet again in 2019 for the premiere of Lelouch's sequel to "A Man and a Woman" in which Aimee and her original co-star Jean-Louis Trintignant were reunited to reprise their characters, now in their 80s.

Aimee had a daughter with film director Nico Papatakis. She also married composer Pierre Barouh, who wrote the iconic theme for "A Man and a Woman".

She lived out the last few decades of her life in Paris's Montmartre district surrounded by cats and dogs.

C.Zeman--TPP