The Best Actresses Ever - France
by dziwnytenswiat | created - 02 Oct 2017 | updated - 2 months ago | PublicNative Speakers from France, Canada, Switzerland and Belgium.
Points from my "The Best Films Ever Made"-Lists. Vol. 1 = 100%, Vol. 2 = 50%, Vol. 3 = 33%, Vol. 4 = 25%, Vol. 5 = 20 %, Vol. 6 = 17%
1. Jeanne Moreau
Actress | Jules et Jim
When people gave Louis Malle credit for making a star of Jeanne Moreau in Elevator to the Gallows (1958) immediately followed by The Lovers (1958), he would point out that Moreau by that time had already been "recognized as the prime stage actress of her generation." She had made it to the Comédie ...
6644 points
2. Simone Signoret
Actress | Les diaboliques
The face of Simone Signoret on the Paris Metro movie posters in March 1982 looked even older than her 61 years. She was still a box-office draw, but the film L'étoile du Nord (1982) would be her last theatrical release; she played the landlady. Signoret had a long film apprenticeship during ...
5493 points
3. Stéphane Audran
Actress | Le charme discret de la bourgeoisie
Stéphane Audran was born on November 8, 1932 in Versailles, Seine-et-Oise [now Yvelines], France as Colette Suzanne Jeannine Dacheville. She was an actress, known for Der diskrete Charme der Bourgeoisie (1972), Babettes Fest (1987) and Der Schlachter (1970). She was married to Claude Chabrol and ...
3923 points
4. Catherine Deneuve
Actress | 8 femmes
Catherine Fabienne Deneuve was born October 22, 1943 in Paris, France, to actor parents Renée Simonot and Maurice Dorléac. She made her movie debut in 1957, when she was barely a teenager and continued with small parts in minor films, until Roger Vadim gave her a meatier role in Vice and Virtue (...
3880 points
5. Anouk Aimée
Actress | 8½
The daughter of actress Geneviève Sorya, in 1948 she played the part of Juliette in The Lovers of Verona (1949). During the 1950s and 1960s she made various films, including Montparnasse 19 (1958) and La Dolce Vita (1960), but only Lola (1961) , Jacques Demy, and A Man and a Woman (1966) Claude ...
3446 points
6. Léa Seydoux
Actress | La vie d'Adèle
French actress Léa Seydoux was born in 1985 in Paris, France, to Valérie Schlumberger, a philanthropist, and Henri Seydoux, a businessman. Her grandfather, Jérôme Seydoux, is chairman of Pathé, and her father is a great-grandson of businessman and inventor Marcel Schlumberger (her mother also ...
2924 points
7. Nathalie Baye
Actress | Catch Me If You Can
Nathalie Baye was born on July 6, 1948 in Mainneville, Eure, France. She is an actress and writer, known for Catch Me If You Can (2002), Laurence Anyways (2012) and Venus Beauty Institute (1999).
2900 points
8. Julie Delpy
Actress | Trois couleurs: Blanc
Julie Delpy was born in Paris, France, in 1969 to Albert Delpy and Marie Pillet, both actors.
She was first featured in Jean-Luc Godard's Detective (1985) at the age of fourteen. She has starred in many American and European productions since then, including Disney's The Three Musketeers (1993), ...
2758 points
9. Juliette Binoche
Actress | The English Patient
Juliette Binoche was born in Paris, France, to Monique Yvette Stalens, a director, teacher, and actress, and Jean-Marie Binoche, a sculptor, director, and actor. Her mother was born in Czestochowa, Poland, of French, Walloon Belgian, and Polish descent, while her father is French. Juliette was only...
2691 points
10. Isabelle Huppert
Actress | Elle
Isabelle Huppert was born March 16, 1953, in Paris, France, but spent her childhood in Ville d'Avray. Encouraged by her mother Annick Huppert (who was a teacher of English), she followed the Conservatory of Versailles and won an acting prize for her work in Alfred de Musset's "Un caprice". She then...
2555 points
11. Emmanuelle Riva
Actress | Hiroshima mon amour
An only child, Emmanuelle was born Paulette Germaine Riva in Cheniménil, but eventually grew up in Remiremont. Her mother, Jeanne Fernande Nourdin, was a seamstress. Her father, René Alfred "Alfredo" Riva, was a sign writer. Her paternal grandfather was Italian. She dreamed of becoming an actress ...
2398 points
12. Marion Cotillard
Actress | La Môme
Academy Award-winning actress Marion Cotillard was born on September 30, 1975 in Paris. Cotillard is the daughter of Jean-Claude Cotillard, an actor, playwright and director, and Niseema Theillaud, an actress and drama teacher. Her father's family is from Brittany.
Raised in Orléans, France, she ...
2383 points
13. Michèle Morgan
Actress | La symphonie pastorale
A classic beauty, blonde French actress Michèle Morgan was one of her country's most popular leading ladies for over five decades. Born Simone Renee Roussel on Leap Year Day (February 29) in 1920, she ran away from home as a teenager and studied acting under René Simon, beginning her film career at...
2303 points
14. Sandrine Bonnaire
Actress | La cérémonie
Sandrine Bonnaire was born on May 31, 1967 in Gannat, Allier, France. She is an actress and director, known for La Cérémonie (1995), To Our Loves (1983) and Vagabond (1985). She was previously married to Guillaume Laurant.
2062 points
15. Arletty
Actress | Les enfants du paradis
Before Arlette-Leonie Bathiat went to the movies she was a secretary and had posed several times as a model for different painters and photographers. In 1920 she debuted on stage at a theatre. She only began to work in movies after 1930. After World War II she was condemned to prison for having ...
2051 points
16. Dominique Sanda
Actress | Il conformista
Dominique Sanda was born in 1951, in Paris, France. When she was 16, she left her upper-class family and married, but divorced two years later. She found a temporary job as a Vogue model, when Robert Bresson gave her the starring part in his absorbing drama A Gentle Woman (1969); she was quite ...
2004 points
17. Danielle Darrieux
Actress | 8 femmes
Danielle Darrieux was born in 1917 in Bordeaux, France, to Marie-Louise (Witkowski) and Germain Jean Darrieux, a physician. She was raised in Paris. She was only fourteen when she auditioned for a secondary role in Le bal (1931): she got the part, and the producer offered her a five-year contract. ...
1929 points
18. Bérénice Bejo
Actress | The Artist
Actress Bérénice Bejo was born in Buenos Aires, the daughter of Silvia De Paoli, a lawyer, and Miguel Bejo, a filmmaker. When she was three, Bejo's family relocated to Paris, France. She embarked on a successful acting career in the 1990s, with various roles in French television and film ...
1898 points
19. Fanny Ardant
Actress | 8 femmes
Fanny Ardant was the youngest of five children born to a cavalry officer and his wife. She was raised in Monte Carlo where she was educated at a convent school. A voracious reader, she discovered Proust when she was 15, and felt as though his writings were for her.
When she was 17 her father died, ...
1805 points
20. Simone Simon
Actress | Cat People
Diminutive, fiery-tempered Simone Simon was born in France, but spent much of her early childhood in Madagascar, where her father managed a graphite mine. Her schooling was somewhat unsettled, her family moving from city to city (Berlin, Budapest, Turin) before finally establishing themselves in ...
1778 points
21. Emmanuelle Seigner
Actress | Bitter Moon
Emmanuelle Seigner is the daughter of a well known photographer and her mother is a journalist. She was born in Paris, France on June 22, 1966. Her grandfather was Louis Seigner, chairman of the Comédie Française and who also appeared in several movies. Emmanuelle was raised at a convent school . ...
1751 points
22. Mélanie Laurent
Actress | Inglourious Basterds
Mélanie Laurent was born in Paris, France. She is the daughter of Annick, a ballet teacher, and Pierre, a voice actor, who is most recognized for the French version of The Simpsons (1989). She has a younger brother, Mathieu, and has both Sephardi Jewish (from Tunisia) and Ashkenazi Jewish (from ...
1725 points
23. Emmanuelle Béart
Actress | 8 femmes
Emmanuelle Béart was born August 14, 1963, in Gassin, France. She lived with her mother, brothers, and sister on a farm not far from Saint-Tropez in Provence (southern France), because her father, singer and poet Guy Béart, did not want his children to be affected by the glamour world of Paris. ...
1643 points
24. Marie-Josée Croze
Actress | Les invasions barbares
Marie-Josée Croze first studied fine arts before opting for the stage at La Veillée-Prospero Theatre workshop in Montreal. In 1993 she got her first movie part in La Florida (1993) and started working for numerous Canadian TV series and movies.
In 2000, with her performance in Denis Villeneuve's ...
1638 points
25. Delphine Seyrig
Actress | The Day of the Jackal
Delphine was born in Beirut on the 10th April 1932 into an intellectual Protestant family. Her Alsatian father, Henri Seyrig, was the director of the Archaeological Institute and later France's cultural attaché in New York during World War Two. Her Swiss mother, Hermine De Saussure, was an adept of...
1615 points
26. Annie Girardot
Actress | La pianiste
Over the course of a five-decade career, she starred in nearly 150 films. She is a three-time César Award winner (1977, 1996, 2002), a two-time Molière Award winner, a BAFTA nominee, and a recipient of several international prizes including the Volpi Cup (Best actress) at the 1965 Venice Film ...
1569 points
27. Charlotte Gainsbourg
Actress | Nymphomaniac: Vol. II
Charlotte Gainsbourg was born in London, England in 1971. She is an Anglo-French actress and singer. The daughter of English singer and actress Jane Birkin and French songwriter, singer and actor Serge Gainsbourg, she was raised in Paris. Charlotte made her motion picture debut in 1984. In 1986, ...
1541 points
28. Geneviève Bujold
Actress | Dead Ringers
Genevieve Bujold spent her first twelve school years in Montreal's oppressive Hochelaga Convent, where opportunities for self-expression were limited to making welcoming speeches for visiting clerics. As a child she felt "as if I were in a long dark tunnel trying to convince myself that if I could ...
1492 points
29. Clémence Poésy
Actress | In Bruges
Clémence Poésy was born Clémence Guichard in Paris in 1982. She took her mother's maiden name, Poésy, as her stage name. She attended an alternative school for most of her education, but spent her last year at L'École alsacienne.
She trained at the "Conservatoire National Supérieur d'Art Dramatique",...
1359 points
30. Anne Consigny
Actress | Elle
Anne Consigny was born on May 25, 1963 in Alençon, Orne, France. She is an actress and director, known for Elle (2016), At Eternity's Gate (2018) and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007).
1346 points
31. Suzanne Clément
Actress | Mommy
Suzanne Clément was born on May 12, 1969 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. She is an actress and director, known for Mommy (2014), Laurence Anyways (2012) and I Killed My Mother (2009).
1242 points
32. Marina Hands
Actress | Lady Chatterley
Daughter of French actress Ludmila Mikaël and British stage director and actor Terry Hands, granddaughter of famous French painter Pierre Dmitrienko, the discrete and beautiful Marina Hands first wanted to be a professional horse-rider but, eventually, had to give up these dreams. In 1995, she ...
1231 points
33. Nicole Garcia
Writer | Mal de pierres
Nicole Garcia was born on April 22, 1946 in Oran, France [now Algeria]. She is an actress and writer, known for From the Land of the Moon (2016), My American Uncle (1980) and Alias Betty (2001).
1217 points
34. Anna Karina
Actress | Vivre sa vie: Film en douze tableaux
Born in Denmark, she came to Paris at 18. She met Coco Chanel and Pierre Cardin and started as a top model. She met Jean-Luc Godard about a cameo in Breathless (1960), but she had to be naked and she refused to play in the movie. One year later, they wed and she became famous with the "Nouvelle ...
1202 point
35. Isabelle Adjani
Actress | Possession
Isabelle Yasmine Adjani was born in Gennevilliers, Hauts-de-Seine, a suburb of Paris, to Emma Augusta "Gusti" (Schweinberger) and Mohammed Adjani. Her father was a Kabyle Algerian, from Iferhounène, and her mother was a Bavarian German. She grew up speaking German fluently. After winning a school ...
1136 points
36. Brigitte Fossey
Actress | Jeux interdits
This lovely, docile, sensitive-appearing blonde French leading lady started impressively in films at age 6, making a most notable debut in René Clément's Forbidden Games (1952). She abandoned acting a few years later for schooling and a normal upbringing. After a brief career as an interpreter and ...
1024 points
37. Miou-Miou
Actress | La science des rêves
Miou-Miou was born Sylvette Herry on February 22, 1950, in Paris, France. Her father was a gendarme, her mother was a sales-woman. Young Miou-Miou was selling strawberries helping out at her mother's fruit and vegetable stand at a street market. There she was spotted by actor-director Romain ...
996 points
38. Adèle Haenel
Actress | Portrait de la jeune fille en feu
Adèle Haenel was born on February 11, 1989 in Paris, France. She is an actress, known for Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), The Unknown Girl (2016) and Love at First Fight (2014).
969 points
39. Karin Viard
Actress | Polisse
Karin Viard was born on January 24, 1966 in Rouen, Seine-Maritime, France. She is an actress and writer, known for Polisse (2011), The Bélier Family (2014) and Paris (2008).
965 points
40. Françoise Fabian
Actress | Ma nuit chez Maud
Françoise Fabian was born on May 10, 1933 in Algiers, Alger, France [now Algeria]. She is an actress and writer, known for My Night at Maud's (1969), Belle de Jour (1967) and Me, Myself and Mum (2013). She was previously married to Marcel Bozzuffi and Jacques Becker.
940 points
41. Sabine Azéma
Actress | Mélo
Sabine Azéma was born on September 20, 1949 in Paris, France. She is an actress and director, known for Mélo (1986), A Sunday in the Country (1984) and Private Fears in Public Places (2006).
886 points
42. Geneviève Page
Actress | Belle de jour
Geneviève Page was born on December 13, 1927 in Paris, France. She is an actress, known for Belle de Jour (1967), The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970) and Fanfan la Tulipe (1952). She was previously married to Jean-Claude Bujard.
807 points
43. Marie-Christine Barrault
Actress | Ma nuit chez Maud
Marie-Christine Barrault was born on March 21, 1944 in Paris, France. She is an actress and writer, known for My Night at Maud's (1969), Cousin, Cousine (1975) and Marie Curie, une femme honorable (1991). She was previously married to Roger Vadim and Daniel Toscan du Plantier.
787 points
44. Leslie Caron
Actress | Gigi
French ballet dancer Leslie Caron was discovered by the legendary MGM star Gene Kelly during his search for a co-star in one of the finest musicals ever filmed, the Oscar-winning An American in Paris (1951), which was inspired by and based on the music of George Gershwin. Leslie's gamine looks and ...
777 points
45. Emmanuelle Devos
Actress | Rois et reine
Emmanuelle Devos was born on May 10, 1964 in Puteaux, Seine [now Hauts-de-Seine], France. She is an actress and writer, known for Kings & Queen (2004), Read My Lips (2001) and Just a Sigh (2013).
764 points
46. Françoise Dorléac
Actress | L'homme de Rio
The radiant Françoise Dorléac is better remembered today as the elder, ill-fated sister of French film star Catherine Deneuve. The Paris-born actress, however, was actually the first to become a star and had quite a formidable career of her own in the 1960s until it was cut short. Born into a ...
696 points
47. Virginie Ledoyen
Actress | 8 femmes
Virginie Ledoyen was born Virginie Fernandez on 15 November 1976 in Aubervilliers, near Paris. At the age of 2, she was already shooting advertisements for television. At 9, she started going to the École des Enfants du Spectacle, and made her film debut at 10 in What Every Frenchwoman Wants (1986)....
692 points
48. Yolande Moreau
Actress | Quand la mer monte...
Yolande Moreau was born on February 27, 1953 in Brussels, Belgium. She is an actress and director, known for When the Sea Rises (2004), Amélie (2001) and Seraphine (2008).
661 points
49. Michèle Mercier
Actress | Angélique, marquise des anges
For Michèle Mercier, the role of Angélique, "the Marquise of the Angels," was both a blessing and a curse. It catapulted her to almost instant stardom, rivaling Brigitte Bardot in her celebrity and popularity, but ruined her acting career. The character of Angélique made to forget the other aspects...
658 points
50. Sylvie Testud
Actress | La Môme
Sylvie Testud was born on January 17, 1971 in Lyon, Rhône, France. She is an actress and writer, known for La Vie En Rose (2007), Suspiria (2018) and Fear and Trembling (2003).
561 points
51. Catherine Spaak
Actress | Il gatto a nove code
Catherine Spaak was born on April 3, 1945 in Boulogne-Billancourt, Seine [now Hauts-de-Seine], France. She was an actress and writer, known for The Cat o' Nine Tails (1971), The Easy Life (1962) and The Empty Canvas (1963). She was married to Vladimiro Tuselli, Daniel Rey, Johnny Dorelli and ...
560 points
52. Edwige Feuillère
Actress | Olivia
Edwige Feuillère was born on October 29, 1907 in Vesoul, Haute-Saône, Franche-Comté, France. She was an actress and writer, known for Olivia (1951), Lucrezia Borgia (1935) and Wicked Duchess (1942). She was married to Pierre Feuillère. She died on November 13, 1998 in Boulogne-Billancourt, ...
514 points
53. Irène Jacob
Actress | La double vie de Véronique
This beautiful, dark-haired French actress made a hit with a supporting role in her first film, as the piano teacher in Louis Malle's "Au revoir, les enfants" (1987). Educated in London and Geneva, and a Paris resident since the age of 18, Jacob became a promising starlet with her Malle success and...
509 points
54. Audrey Tautou
Actress | Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain
Audrey Justine Tautou was born on August 9, 1976 in Beaumont, France, to Evelyne Marie Laure (Nuret), a teacher, and Bernard Tautou, a dental surgeon. Audrey showed an interest for comedy at an early age and started her acting lessons at 'Cours Florent'. In 1998 she won the best young actress award...
444 points
55. Brigitte Bardot
Actress | Le mépris
Brigitte Bardot was born on September 28, 1934 in Paris, France. Her father had an engineering degree and worked with his father in the family business. Brigitte's mother encouraged her daughter to take up music and dance, and she proved to be very adept at it. By the time she was 15, Brigitte was ...
442 points
56. Isabelle Carré
Actress | Les émotifs anonymes
Isabelle Carré was born on May 28, 1971 in Paris, France. She is an actress, known for Romantics Anonymous (2010), Anna M. (2007) and Se souvenir des belles choses (2001). She has been married to Bruno Pesery since August 26, 2006. They have one child.
409 points
57. Michèle Laroque
Actress | Ma vie en rose
Michèle Laroque was born on June 15, 1960 in Nice, Alpes-Maritimes, France. She is an actress and writer, known for Ma vie en rose (1997), Brillantissime (2018) and The Closet (2001).
407 points
58. Marie Trintignant
Actress | Colette, une femme libre
Marie Trintignant died tragically on the 1st of August, 2003 from a cerebral edema in Neuilly-sur-Seine near Paris, France, following a violent fight with her boyfriend, Bertrand Cantat, lead singer in the French rock band, Noir Désir. She was just finishing filming a TV movie about Colette, ...
397 points
59. Cécile de France
Actress | L'auberge espagnole
Cecile de France was born in Namur in Belgium in 1975 and discovered her vocation at the early age of six. As soon as she was seventeen, she was off to Paris with the ambition of beginning a career on the stage. She studied drama with Jean-Paul Denizon, actor and assistant to Peter Brook, before ...
389 points
60. Dany Robin
Actress | Topaz
This pert, petite, delicate, dreamy-eyed French dish of post-war filming with the piled-high blonde hairdo was a one-time threat to the sexy, kittenish pedestal Brigitte Bardot stood on during the 1950s. While working for such legendary directors as Marcel Carné, Marc Allégret, Julien Duvivier, ...
331 points
61. Capucine
Actress | The Pink Panther
With classic patrician features and an independent, non-conformist personality, Capucine began her film debut in 1949 at the age of 21 with an appearance in the film Rendezvous in July (1949). She attended school in France and received a BA degree in foreign languages. Married for six months in her...
328 points
62. Sophie Marceau
Actress | La boum
Sophie Marceau was born Sophie Danièle Sylvie Maupu in Paris, France, to Simone (Morisset), a shop assistant, and Benoît Maupu, a truck driver. She grew up far from the studio spotlights. When she was 14 she was living in the Paris suburb of Gentilly with her father. She learned from friends that ...
264 points
63. Corinne Calvet
Actress | Rope of Sand
Petite, seductive French leading lady who underwent several early career changes before settling on the acting profession. Corinne Calvet first studied criminal law at France's renowned Sorbonne, but then turned her attention to interior decoration specializing in fine arts and antiques. After ...
237 points
64. Eva Green
Actress | Casino Royale
French actress and model Eva Gaëlle Green was born on July 6, 1980, in Paris, France. Her father, Walter Green, is a dentist who appeared in the 1966 film Au hasard Balthazar (1966). Her mother, Marlène Jobert, is an actress turned children's book writer. Eva's mother was born in Algeria, of French...
237 points
65. Ludivine Sagnier
Actress | Lupin
The French actress Ludivine Sagnier was born on July 3, 1979 in La Celle-Saint-Cloud, in France's Yvelines department. Ludivine studied acting as a young girl and had made her movie debut at the age 10 in Les maris, les femmes, les amants (1989). She has established her reputation as one of the ...
185 points
66. Carole Bouquet
Actress | For Your Eyes Only
Carole Bouquet is a French actress and fashion model. She is best known for played Bond girl Melina Havelock in the James Bond film For Your Eyes Only (1981).
She also starred in That Obscure Object of Desire (1977), Nemo (1984), The Bridge (1999) and Do Not Disturb (2014).
In 2017 she starred in the...
185 points
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