French screen star Alain Delon dies aged 88

The celebrated actor and star of Plein Soleil and Le Samouraï has died, his children have said

Peter Bradshaw: Mesmeric and beautiful, Alain Delon was one of cinema’s most mysterious stars A life in pictures.

Alain Delon, the celebrated actor who starred in a string of classics such as Plein Soleil, Le Samouraï and Rocco and His Brothers, has died aged 88, his children have told French media.

“Alain Fabien, Anouchka, Anthony, as well as [his dog] Loubo, are deeply saddened to announce the passing of their father. He passed away peacefully in his home in Douchy, surrounded by his three children and his family,” they said in a statement, adding the family has asked for privacy.

Identified with French cinema’s resurgence in the 1960s, Delon played a string of cops, hitmen and beautifully chiselled chancers for some of the country’s greatest directors, including Jean-Pierre Melville, René Clément and Jacques Deray. He also made films with auteurs including Luchino Visconti, Louis Malle, Michelangelo Antonioni and Jean-Luc Godard – though never quite succeeded in his attempts to make it in Hollywood.

Born in 1935 in Sceaux in the Paris suburbs, Delon was expelled from several schools before leaving at 14 to work in a butcher’s shop. After a stint in the navy (during which he saw combat in France’s colonial war in Vietnam), he was dishonourably discharged in 1956 and drifted into acting. He was spotted by Hollywood producer David O Selznick at Cannes and signed to a contract, but decided to try his luck in French cinema and made his debut with a small role in Yves Allégret’s 1957 thriller Send a Woman When the Devil Fails.

Delon’s intense good looks made an immediate impact, and he swiftly graduated to lead roles. In 1958 he was cast opposite Romy Schneider in Christine, as a soldier and a musician’s daughter who fall in love. Delon and Schneider began a high profile real-life romance off the set, which confirmed Delon’s burgeoning reputation as a sex symbol.

Delon had a complicated personal life, including extended relationships with Schneider, Mireille Darc (from whom he separated in 1982 after 15 years together), and Rosalie van Breemen, a Dutch model with whom he had two children and from whom he separated in 2002. He was married to Nathalie Delon from 1964 to 1968; they had one child, Anthony, in 1964. In 1962, the singer and model Nico gave birth to a son, Christian; Delon denied paternity but the child was adopted by Delon’s mother.