The long read · French cinema
The Resilience of French Cinema and Its Global Stars
Cinema was born in Paris, and France has loved and championed it ever since: the first public screening, the first studios, the New Wave and the world’s most famous film festival. Here is the story of French film, with official trailers and the places in Paris to see it.
Updated October 2026
Where cinema began (1895–1945)
On 28 December 1895 Auguste and Louis Lumière held the world’s first paid public film screening in a café on the Boulevard des Capucines. Gaumont and Pathé, founded in the same years, are the oldest film companies still at work, and in 1902 Georges Méliès sent a rocket into the eye of the Moon in A Trip to the Moon.
Between the wars French poetic realism gave the cinema some of its greatest films, from Jean Renoir’s La Grande Illusion to Marcel Carné’s Les Enfants du paradis (1945), made during the war and still one of the most loved French films of all.
The New Wave and the golden age (1946–1980s)
In 1946 the first Cannes Film Festival was held, and France became the meeting place of world cinema. At the Cinémathèque française, founded by Henri Langlois in 1936, a generation of young critics learned their craft, and at the end of the 1950s they became the New Wave: François Truffaut won best director at Cannes for The 400 Blows in 1959, and Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless (1960) broke every rule of film-making.
Agnès Varda, Jacques Demy, Éric Rohmer and Claude Chabrol followed, and Jacques Tati’s Mon Oncle and Truffaut’s Day for Night both won the Oscar.
Paris on film: from The 400 Blows to Midnight in Paris
The modern era
French cinema remains one of the strongest in the world. Michel Hazanavicius’s silent comedy The Artist became the first French film to win the Oscar for best picture in 2012, and the Palme d’Or has gone to Blue Is the Warmest Colour (2013), Julia Ducournau’s Titane (2021) and Justine Triet’s Anatomy of a Fall (2023), which also won the Oscar for its screenplay.
Must-watch films: the classics
To understand French cinema, start with the classics, then the modern masters.
- A Trip to the Moon (Le Voyage dans la Lune, 1902): Georges Méliès’s magical fantasy, one of the first great films.
- Les Enfants du paradis (1945): Marcel Carné’s epic of love and the theatre in nineteenth-century Paris.
- The 400 Blows (Les Quatre Cents Coups, 1959): François Truffaut’s portrait of a Paris boyhood, the film that launched the New Wave.
- Breathless (À bout de souffle, 1960): Jean-Luc Godard’s first feature, with Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jean Seberg.
Must-watch films: the modern masters
- Amélie (Le Fabuleux Destin d’Amélie Poulain, 2001): Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Montmartre fairy tale with Audrey Tautou.
- La Vie en rose (2007): Olivier Dahan’s life of Édith Piaf, for which Marion Cotillard won the Oscar.
- The Artist (2011): Michel Hazanavicius’s silent-film love letter to Hollywood, winner of the Oscar for best picture.
- Anatomy of a Fall (Anatomie d’une chute, 2023): Justine Triet’s courtroom drama, winner of the Palme d’Or and an Oscar.
The stars
France has given the screen some of its most famous faces.
- Catherine Deneuve: from The Umbrellas of Cherbourg to Belle de Jour, the great lady of French cinema.
- Jean-Paul Belmondo (1933–2021): the star of Breathless and dozens of popular hits.
- Isabelle Huppert: one of the most acclaimed actresses in the world, with a record number of César nominations.
- Juliette Binoche: Oscar winner for The English Patient.
- Marion Cotillard and Jean Dujardin: Oscar winners for La Vie en rose and The Artist.
Where to watch in Paris
Paris has more cinemas than almost any city in the world. The Cinémathèque française in Bercy shows the great classics and has a museum of cinema, and the Grand Rex, with its starry Art Deco auditorium, is the most spectacular picture palace in France. Many Paris cinemas show films in their original language, marked “VO”.
Our advice: look for “VOST” or “VO” in the listings to find films in the original language with French subtitles, and see at least one classic at the Cinémathèque.
La Cinémathèque française Le Grand Rex Paris on film The Cannes Film Festival: our French Riviera guide
Hidden on the silver screen: international productions filmed in France
Paris may be the most filmed city in the world, from An American in Paris and Charade to Midnight in Paris, and our Paris on film page walks you through its most famous locations. Beyond the capital, Alfred Hitchcock’s To Catch a Thief (1955), with Cary Grant and Grace Kelly, made the French Riviera the most glamorous setting in Hollywood.
The French in Hollywood
French stars and film-makers have long crossed the Atlantic.
- Claudette Colbert (1903–1996): born in Saint-Mandé near Paris, she won the Oscar for It Happened One Night.
- Charles Boyer (1899–1978): the great romantic star of Algiers and Gaslight.
- Leslie Caron: the star of An American in Paris and Gigi.
- Luc Besson: the director of Léon and The Fifth Element, made with Hollywood stars.
Questions and answers
Where was the first film screening?
At the Grand Café on the Boulevard des Capucines in Paris, where the Lumière brothers held the first paid public screening on 28 December 1895.
When is the Cannes Film Festival?
Every May on the Riviera; see our French Riviera guide to the festival.
Join the conversation
Which French film or star do you love most? Share your favourite scenes and the films we should add.
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Sources: the Festival de Cannes, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Cinémathèque française, Gaumont, Pathé and the Institut Lumière, checked on 5 November 2026. Trailers are embedded from the official YouTube channels of each film’s distributor; where none exists online, we leave it out.