Jowan Le Besco

Born on August 26th 1981, Jowan Le Besco is a French actor, scriptwriter, director and chief cameraman. He is the second child in a family of five, the son of Franco-Algerian actress and journalist of Kabyl and Turco-Mongol descent, Catherine Belkhodja. His Breton father is of Vietnamese descent.

He has worked on many occasions with his brother and sisters, with whom he collaborates on a regular basis as chief cameraman. He has video captured the live theatre performance of Pois chiche by Maïwenn Le Besco, one of his sisters, also an actress and director, twice nominated for a César Award in 2007 for her first film "Pardonnez-moi". He also played with his sister Isild Le Besco in "Princesse Marie", a film featuring Catherine Deneuve. He was chief cameraman in two films written and directed by Isild: "Demi-tarif", produced by their sister Leonor Graser and independent French film production company Karedas, featuring their younger brother Kolia Litscher in a main role, and "Charly", also produced by Isild, on which he collaborated again with Isild and Kolia.

Career

A former pupil of Lycée Charlemagne and Lycée Victor Hugo in Paris, two secondary schools renowned for their academic excellence, Jowan started cinema studies at the Paris Sorbonne University of Jussieu, during which he directed a large number of short films. An award received for one of his short films won him editing software, which he used in a number of music video clips. He then decided to further his studies at the Lyon Institut Lumière and Paris Gobelins School. He took part in Isild’s first short film produced by SOPADIN (a scriptwriting competition organisation), and went on by taking charge of photography in "Demi-tarif", which won an award for best Junior script. Given their young age - both were under 20, Jowan and Isild had experienced the greatest difficulty finding a producer for this project. KAREDAS decided to trust them: as a result, the film was presented at over fifty festivals and widely acclaimed by film critics. Even though he has occasionally held roles as an actor, Jowan’s objective has always been to stick to film photography training. To this end, he studied with Stéphane Marty, later with Caroline Champetier during the making of "L'Intouchable", shot in India where he was in charge of capturing the cremation scenes.With the success of Demi-tarif, he was able to prepare Isild’s second film "Charly" with greater ease, as the project was funded by an advance on future box-office receipts from the CNC, as well as receiving the support of Arte.The film is to be released on 12th September 2007.Following an extended solitary stay in an Indian monastery, he brought back Yapo, a documentary that was selected for the 29th Cinéma du Réel Documentary Festival, a yearly event for ethnological or social documentary films organised by the Pompidou Centre in Paris.

Filmography

Feature films

* 1999 : "La Puce" by Emmanuelle Bercot (actor)
* 2002 : "Un moment de bonheur" by Antoine Santana (actor)
* 2004 : "À tout de suite" by Benoît Jacquot (assistant)
* 2004 : "Princesse Marie" by Benoît Jacquot (actor)
* 2006 : "L'Intouchable" by Benoît Jacquot (cameraman - assistant/second team)
* 2007 : "Yapo" by Jowan Le Besco (scriptwriter, director, chief cameraman, editor)
* 2007 : "Charly" by Isild Le Besco (chief cameraman)

hort films

* 1999 : "Cinematon" by Gérard Courant (actor)
* 2003 : "Quelqu'un vous aime" (assistant)

Television

Theatre

* 2004 : "Le Pois chiche" by Maïwenn Le Besco at the Café de la Gare theatre, with Maïwenn (video capture)

Awards

(for Demi-tarif)
* 2000: Award for best Junior script at the Paris Film Festival for Demi-tarif (as camera operator)
* 2004 : Special Jury Award for Demi-tarif at the European First Film Festival of Angers (as chief cameraman)
* 2004 : Procirep - Premiers Plans Award for Demi-tarif at Angers (as chief cameraman)
* 2004 : Special Jury Award for Demi-tarif at Seoul Festival (as chief cameraman)
* 2004: Jury Award for Demi-tarif at the Crossing Europe Festival of Linz (as chief cameraman)
* 2004 : Demi-tarif nominated for Louis Delluc Award (as chief cameraman)

Links

* [http://french.imdb.com/name/nm0494067/] for Jowan’s filmography
* [http://dvdtoile.com/Filmographie.php?id=65938] for Jowan’s photos and posters
* [http://www.unifrance.org/perso/perso.asp?CommonUser=&langue=21004&perso=327568] Jowan on Unifrance website