Sunday 10 April 2022

Jean-Paul Belmondo: Legendary French Film Actor and Boxing Afficionado

Jean-Paul Belmondo

I had no idea that Jean-Paul Belmondo, the legendary French actor, passed away last September at the age of eighty-eight.

The son of an Algerian Pied-Noir of Italian descent, he had a brief but undefeated spell as an amateur boxer from 1949 to 1950.

I understand that he never lost his passion for the sport. When he attended boxing events, he watched everything from the preliminaries to the main event. He was friendly with boxers and gave them advice and encouragement.

Belmondo played the role of a boxer in the 1963 movie "Magnet of Doom". He also played a boxer turned World War I aviator in "L'as des as", a fictionalised version of events in the life of Georges Carpentier.

He was a prominent part of what came to be known as the New Wave of French Cinema but was also a mainstream actor who imprinted his unique screen persona into the consciousness of French film fans and international audiences.

Belmondo was born on April 9th, 1933 and died on September 6th, 2021.

© Adeyinka Makinde (2022).

Adeyinka Makinde is a writer based in London, England.



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