On social networks as on television channels, tributes are increasing. The world of French cinema is in mourning: Jean-Paul Belmondo – actor, producer, theater director of legend – died on Monday, September 6, 2021, at the age of 88, in his Parisian home. “He had been very tired for some time. He died quietly“, announced his lawyer, Me Michel Godest, to AFP. Since 2001, nearly 20 years, the actor was weakened by a terrible stroke having left him aftereffects against which he fought until the end of his life.
While on vacation in Corsica, accompanied by his friend Guy Bedos, Jean-Paul Belmondo was the victim of a serious stroke which was almost fatal. Paralyzed on the right side of the face and unable to speak, it will stay away from the plateaus for several years, but will not give up for all that.
“When we die, we live again“
Will then begin the fight of the life of Jean-Paul Belmondo who will do everything to find a maximum of faculties. In 2017, in an interview with Figaro, the one we nickname “Bebel “ will look back over the years that marked its existence: “I thought I had to get out of it and that I could do it on condition, once again, that I wanted to, as they (his parents) had always taught me “. Finally, he will succeed in regaining the use of speech: “I woke up jabbering. It took me two years to be able to speak again when the doctor told me I would never speak again. I have arrived“.
It is a message loaded with optimism and hope that Jean-Paul Belmondo delivered at the time: “The will allows a lot of things. And not just in the cinema! I believe that there is something and that, when we die, we live again. In what, I do not know but we live again, that, for sure “. Words which, four years later, take on their full meaning.
It is an icon of French cinema with an exceptional career that disappears, Jean-Paul Belmondo not only leaves behind him great unforgettable roles, but also the memory ofan optimistic man who never gave up.