Jean-Pierre Jeunet

A self-taught filmmaker with a remarkable visual sense, Jean-Pierre Jeunet started in animation, and along with partner Marc Caro, crafted fantasy-oriented short films that displayed wonderful ingenuity and an impeccable sense of design and atmosphere. These qualities carried over into the pair's first two feature films, "Delicatessen" (1991) and "The City of Lost Children" (1995), which unfolded in fascinating and surreal worlds that were both retrograde and of a future time, peopled by loveable misfits and villainous grotesques. The pair went their separate ways after Jeunet ventured into Hollywood filmmaking with "Alien: Resurrection" (1997), but upon returning to his home country and the degree of creative autonomy to which he was accustomed, Jeunet crafted his most popular effort, the award-winning international favorite, "Amélie" (2001). Subsequent productions displayed Jeunet's now customary visual strengths, supplemented by dark and often unusual humor, with tones alternating between playful, sweet, dangerous and even nightmarish. Sometimes drawing comparisons to Monty Python alumnus Terry Gilliam, but retaining a truly distinctive aesthetic sense and vision, Jeunet emerged as an important artist whose approach and imagination were best served by projects that allowed him to indulge his creative potential with a minimum of front office interference.