![]() ![]() He Loves Me Not") (2002) and joined the international ensemble of Cedric Klapisch's "L' Auberge Espagnole" ("Pot Luck") (2002), a Cesar nominee for Best Film that followed the adventures of a newly single Frenchman staying at a youth hostel in Barcelona. She went on to play an art student involved with a married doctor in "À la Folie. Tautou followed up her international breakout in a string of popular but less impactful French romantic comedies, beginning with "Dieu est Grand, Je Suis Toute Petite" ("God is Great, I'm Not") (2002), in which she starred as a young woman searching for love and spirituality. ![]() At home, the film swept the 2002 Cesar Awards for Best Film, Best Director, Best Music, and Best Production Design while Tautou earned a nomination for Best Actress. In addition to becoming a runaway hit in France and throughout Europe, in America - where it was known simply as "Amélie" - the film became the top-grossing French import of all time and went on to earn five Academy Award nominations, including Best Foreign Language Film and Best Screenplay. ![]() Propelled by Tautou's sly yet vulnerable performance and a bright, stylized vision of an idealized Parisian life, the film immediately won over both critics and audiences alike. Merely seconds into her audition, Jeunet was convinced that this petite, doe-eyed ingénue possessed the qualities he was looking for in the title character - a waitress in the artsy Montmartre neighborhood of Paris who delights in injecting anonymous doses of joy into the lives of others, while gun-shy about claiming her own piece of happiness. Tautou caught her big break when British actress Emily Watson turned down a proposed teaming with director Jean-Pierre Jeunet in "Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain" (2001). Tautou took the lead in "Le Battement d'Ailes du Papillon" ("Happenstance") (2001), a contemplation of happenstance and intertwined lives in which Tautou proved her ability to carry a film with her coy charm and her flair for romantic comedy. Following her breakthrough role, Tautou appeared as a teen runaway in "Voyous Voyelles" ("Pretty Devils") (1999) and supported handsome actor Vincent Perez in "Epouse-moi" ("Marry Me") (2000), as well starred in the regrettable sex comedy "Le Libertin" ("The Libertine") (2000). Her head-turning performance earned Tautou a Cesar Award for Most Promising Female Newcomer. After winning a talent competition sponsored by the television network Canal+, Tautou made her feature film debut in a supporting role as a sweetly innocent beauty salon worker who engages in a flirtation with an older gentleman in "Venus Beaute Institut" ("Venus Beauty Institute") (1999). ![]() She trained at the famed Cours Florent drama school and earned her early professional credits in French television movies. 9, 1976 (some sources say 1978), Tautou was raised in the mountainous region of Auvergne in central France, but set out for Paris at age 17 to pursue a career as a comic actress. Tautou's experience in an overblown, critically reviled hit failed to draw her to American filmmaking, so she promptly returned to the French fold where a starring role as design icon Coco Chanel in "Coco Before Chanel" (2009) proved that the actress had a whole career of increasingly mature roles ahead of her once her quirky, youthful charm had run its course.īorn Aug. theaters, however following the art house success of "Amélie" and the World War I-set romantic drama "A Very Long Engagement" (2004), Tautou answered the call of Hollywood, co-starring opposite Tom Hanks in the blockbuster thriller "The Da Vinci Code" (2006). Many of Tautou's popular French films did not make it to U.S. With her wide eyes and shy, winsome smile, the brunette gamine instantly earned comparisons to Audrey Hepburn, and like Hepburn, she successfully built a film career alternating between light romantic comedies and teary dramas. French actress Audrey Tautou hit the international spotlight in 2001 as the star of the whimsical Parisian romance "Amélie" (2001), which went on to become the top-grossing French-language film ever released in the United States. ![]()
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