Georges Lautner

Georges Lautner had just begun to dabble in the film industry when he was called away to military service in Austria. He continued his exploration of cinema in the army's film unit, alongside French cinematographer Claude Lecomte ("The Grand Highway") and director Marcel Bluwal ("Carom Shots"). Lautner returned to the industry and solidified his reputation with the theater-going audiences with the 1961 comedy "The Black Monocle," the tale of a strange rendezvous between various European nationals at the castle of a marquis. The '70s were a prolific decade for Lautner, with several box office hits and misses, but the '80s brought some of his most celebrated films. These included the 1981 crime drama "The Professional," about a French assassin sent to kill an African leader. One of Georges Lautner's more memorable films was actually an earlier one; in 1963, he collaborated with writer Michel Audiard and actor Lino Ventura to produce the popular gangster film "Les tontons flingueurs."