Romain Duris is an incredible versatile French actor who can switch up gears like the best, one second you can be laughing as loud as possible and the next you can be in tears crying in the floor, that’s how good he is. He possesses a certain je ne sais quoi, a certain unique charm that belongs to him not because he is French but because he is Romain Duris.
And the funny thing about his story is that it was fate that turned him into an actor, he was noticed in the street by a casting director while waiting in a queue in 1993 and was offered a part in the 1994 Cédric Klapisch film Le péril jeune (The good old daze). With the years he learned to love his new craft and to master it, and to become a household name for french cinema.
He is an actor who loves his craft and would rather be able to do his craft in his home country and other European countries than jump into the Hollywood bandwagon and be type casted for his accent, his look, his country of birth. I applaud him for that, not many have the guts to say that success comes not from money but for doing work others can love and you can be proud off. I admire his capacity and his tenacity, since the first time I saw one of his movies I knew I had found an actor whose films I wanted to see, to dissect, to understand and to enjoy.
Of the few movies that I have had the pleasure to see, I would recommend the following:
- L’Auberge Espagnole (2002) : The Spanish Apartment
- Populaire (2012) : Populaire
- L’Arnacœur (2010) : Heartbreaker
- Molière (2007) : Molière
- Paris (2008) : Paris
But if you want to see more, below is a video created by Francophone in which they enlist his top 15 movies according to them.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5Xfv5DBPYQ
