PARIS, June 5, 2007 (AFP) - France's cultural and political elite turned out Monday for the funeral service of the much-loved French actor and filmmaker Jean-Claude Brialy, one of the stars of New Wave cinema in the 1950s and 1960s.

President Nicolas Sarkozy was among the mourners gathered at Saint Louis en l'Ile church in central Paris for a solemn tribute to Brialy, a household name in French film who died aged 74 last Wednesday after a long illness.

French screen idols Jeanne Moreau and Catherine Deneuve and the icon of post-war chanson Juliette Greco were also among the crowd, alongside the veteran actors Alain Delon and Jean-Paul Belmondo.

Outside the church a crowd of well-wishers gathered, clapping as the oak coffin was carried past to its final resting place in Montmartre cemetery.

With a career spanning four decades, Brialy worked with some of the best directors of his generation, including the New Wave pioneers Francois Truffaut, Louis Malle and Jean-Luc Godard.

At his own request, no speeches were made during the ceremony, which was held to the soft music of Jacques Brel and Nana Mouskouri.

"You who always had kind things to say about others, you found it hard to hear the same said of you," said the Archbishop of Gap, Jean-Michel Di Falco, in a tribute to the actor.

The son of a French colonel, Brialy was born in Algeria and discovered cinema during his military service when he worked in an army film unit.

After walk-on parts in a string of hit movies including Truffaut's 1959 classic "The 400 blows" and Malle's "Frantic" in 1957, fame arrived in 1958 with lead roles in two Claude Chabrol films, "Le Beau Serge" and "The Cousins".

The success kickstarted his marathon career as an actor, including as the lead in Jean-Luc Godard's 1961 classic "A woman is a woman," and then director, with a dozen works to his name since the 1971 "Eglantine."

A household name in French film whose close friends included the late actress Romy Schneider, Brialy had owned a popular Paris theatre, "Les Bouffes du Nord" since 1986 and was a regular guest on radio and television.
 

Copyright AFP

Subject: French news