Biography
Jean-Pierre Melville (born Jean-Pierre Grumbach) was an amateur filmmaker as a teenager who, after the start of World War II, began making his own independent short and feature films. He hit his stride in the '50s with his memorable adaptation of
Jean Cocteau's novel, Les Enfants Terribles, and, over the next 20 years, specialized in intelligent and exciting crime films, most notably
Bob le Flambeur,
Le Doulos (aka
The Finger Man),
Le Samouraï,
Le Cercle Rouge, and
Un Flic. Melville also acted in his own
Deux Hommes Dans Manhattan, as well as Cocteau's
Orphee,
Jean-Luc Godard's À Bout de Souffle (aka
Breathless), and
Claude Chabrol's
Landru (aka
Bluebeard). He died in 1973. ~ All Movie Guide