Anouk Aimée, enigmatic star of “A Man and a Woman”, dies at the age of 92

Anouk Aimée, the French film actress who became an international sex symbol as the distant, enigmatic and sensual star of Claude Lelouch’s 1966 romance film “A Man and a Woman,” died on Tuesday at the age of 92.

Her death was announced on social media by her daughter Manuela Papatakis, who said her mother died at home in Paris.

Ms. Aimée had already gained considerable recognition in international film, notably in Federico Fellini’s films “La Dolce Vita” (1960), in which she played a sex-hungry Italian society lady, and “8 1/2” (1963), in which she portrayed the jealous but patient wife of the main character.

But it was with A Man and a Woman, a low-budget project by a 28-year-old director that won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, that she created the image that has lasted her entire career. An emotionally reserved young widow and script girl of the film industry, she falls in love with a racing driver and widower played by Jean-Louis Trintignant. Their long, long-awaited kiss, enhanced by a circling camera and Francis Lai’s hit theme, became one of the era’s most revered and recognizable film images. Ms. Aimée was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress for the role. The film also earned her the BAFTA Film Award for Best Foreign Language Actress and the Golden Globe for Best Film Actress.

In 2002, she received an honorary César Award, the French equivalent of an Oscar, for her professional life’s work. At the 1980 Cannes Film Festival, she was named Best Actress for her role in the Italian film “Salto nel Vuoto,” which was released in the United States under the title “Leap Into the Void.” She played a mentally disturbed woman whose brother hopes that she will commit suicide.

Ms. Aimée’s film career was based primarily in Europe, and her relatively few American films were not particularly successful. She was part of the star-studded cast of “Ready to Wear” (1994), Robert Altman’s poorly received satire of the fashion industry. A quarter century earlier, she had played the title character in the 1969 George Cukor-directed drama “Justine.” In a 2000 interview with the Palm Beach Post, she recalled her unsatisfying collaboration with Cukor. “I kept talking about Fellini,” she said, “and he kept talking about Garbo.”

Nicole Françoise Sorya Dreyfus was born on April 27, 1932 in Paris, the daughter of Henri Dreyfus, who had acted in films under the name Henry Murray, and Geneviève Sorya, who also pursued a career as a film actress.

At the age of 13, Françoise was approached by Henri Calef, a director who cast her in the film “La Maison Sous la Mer” (1947). She was announced simply as Anouk, the name of her character. The surname Aimée, the French word for “beloved”, was added later.

While still a teenager, she attracted international attention with her role as a modern Juliet in The Lovers of Verona (1951). The critic Bosley Crowther, writing in the New York Times, hated the film but described the young woman Aimée as “a charming and enterprising young lady.”

Ms. Aimée played leading roles in Jacques Demy’s “Lola” (1961), a New Wave soap opera about a cabaret performer, and in his “Model Shop” (1969). She played an art student in “Les Amants de Montparnasse” (1958), a biography of the artist Modigliani, which was released in the United States in 1961.

A Man and a Woman 20 Years Later, the sequel to 1986’s Mr. Lelouch starring Ms. Aimée and Mr. Trintignant, was a box office flop in France and the United States. Their next effort, The Best Years of a Lifetime (2019), fared slightly better. Although critics found the story too sentimental (the characters reunite in old age), the film “occasionally struck a sublime grace,” as The Hollywood Reporter noted.

She continued to work in European films and television programs until she was over 80. Her last American film was Henry Jaglom’s “Festival in Cannes” (2002), in which she played an ageing European film legend. “The Best Years of Living” was her last film, before which came “Tous les Soleils” (2011), about a lonely music professor, and “Mince Alors!” (2012), a comedy about a weight-loss retreat.

Ms. Aimée was married and divorced four times. Her longest marriage, from 1970 to 1978, was also her last, to British actor Albert Finney. Her first marriage (1949-1950) was to Edouard Zimmermann, and her second (1951-1954) was to screenwriter and director Nikos Papatakis, with whom she had a daughter. Her third husband (1966-1969) was Pierre Barouh, a French actor and composer whom she met when he played her character’s deceased husband in “A Man and a Woman.”

She leaves behind her daughter, a granddaughter and a great-granddaughter.

Over the years, Ms. Aimée has expressed her strong opinions on many subjects, including politics and fashion, but she was less open about herself. When it came to her life, she revealed at most a certain passivity or a feeling of doom.

When interviewed in Cannes in 1986 by journalists such as Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times, she looked back on her career and recalled that she had been “discovered” in the old Hollywood sense when she was still a teenager.

“I didn’t choose this,” she said. “I took everything for granted.”

When asked by The Times in 1967 about her collaboration with the director and her co-stars on “A Man and a Woman,” the film that changed her life, Ms. Aimée said simply: “We all met at the right time.”

Derrick Taylor contributed reporting.