Biography: life and films
Costa-Gavras (real name: Konstantínos Gavrás) is a French film director.
He was born in Loutra-Iraias, Greece on 12 February 1933.
After graduating from the IDHEC, France's leading film school,
Costa-Gavras began his career as an assistant to René
Clément, Henri Verneuil and Jacques Demy. His debut
feature
Compartiment tueurs (1965), a
conventional 1960s French thriller, was well-received by the critics
and was a box office hit in France and the United States. It
wasn't until his third film,
Z (1969), that Costa-Gavras's
distinctive identity as a filmmaker emerged. The first of several
collaborations with Yves Montand, the film drew its inspiration from
contemporary events in Greece and became a worldwide hit.
Z took the Jury Prize at Cannes in
1969 and the 1970 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.
Costa-Gavras followed this up with a series of acclaimed political
thrillers and dramas that included
L'Aveu (1970),
État
de siège (1972) and
Missing (1982), the latter of
which won the Palme d'Or as Cannes in 1982 and the Best Film Oscar in
1983. His controversial wartime drama
Section spéciale earned
him the Best Director award at Cannes in 1975. Costa-Gavras
strayed into even more contentious territory with
Amen.
(2002), which examined the Catholic Church's complicity in the Nazi
Holocaust. His less typical films include the bittersweet
romantic drama
Clair de femme (1979) and
comedy-thriller
Le Couperet (2005).
© James Travers 2013
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Filmography
Key: d = director; w = writer; a = actor
Compartiment tueurs (1965) [d,w]
Un homme de trop (1967) [d,w]
Z (1969) [d,w]
L'Aveu (1970) [d]
État de siège (1972) [d,w]
Section spéciale (1975) [d,w]
Monsieur Klein (1976) [w]
La Vie devant soi (1977) [a]
Clair de femme (1979) [d,w]
Missing (1982) [d,w]
Hanna K. (1983) [d,w]
Spies Like Us (1985) [a]
Conseil de famille (1986) [d,w]
Betrayed (1988) [d]
Music Box (1989) [d]
Contre l'oubli (1991) [d]
La Petite apocalypse (1993) [d,w]
À propos de Nice, la suite (1995) [d]
Lumière et compagnie (1995) [d]
Mad City (1997) [d]
Amen. (2002) [d,w]
Le Couperet (2005) [d,w]
Mon colonel (2006) [w]
Eden à l'Ouest (2009) [d,w]
L'Enfer d'Henri-Georges Clouzot (2009) [a]
Burke and Hare (2010) [a]
Le Capital (2012) [d,w]
