Mourning for movie star

Acting legend Niels Arestrup dead at 75

Character actor Niels Arestrup specialized in deep and dark roles.

(Bild: picturedesk.com/DANIEL NAUPOLD / EPA)

He was one of France's best-known character actors and was best known in France for Jacques Audiard's prison film "A Prophet" and for his performance as a German general in Volker Schlöndorff's World War II Paris drama "Diplomacy": actor Niels Arestrup has died at the age of 75.

This was reported by the French media, citing his wife. He left at the "end of a courageous fight against illness", "surrounded by the love of his family", she was quoted as saying by the radio station France Info.

Dark and profound
In his long career, Niels Arestrup often played roles that were deep and dark, such as in "The Prophet", in which he plays a brutal Corsican mafioso. He received his first César for Best Supporting Actor for this role.

He won the same award for his role in Audiard's film "The Taste of Rust and Bone". He also shot the thriller "The Wild Beat of My Heart" with Audiard.

Niels Arestrup

(Bild: APA Pool/AFP)

Schlöndorff's "Diplomacy" also thrives on his acting skills. In the film drama about the failure to destroy Paris in 1944, he plays the German General Dietrich von Choltitz. In a thrilling psychological duel between two completely unequal men, the film tells how a Swedish diplomat (André Dussollier), in an unprecedented struggle, dissuades the Nazi general (Arestrup), who is determined to do anything, from his murderous plan to blow up the French capital, which Hitler had ordered ("Paris must not fall into the hands of the enemy, or only as a field of rubble").

In addition to Audiard and Schlöndorff, Arestrup has also worked with many other well-known directors, including Alain Resnais and Steven Spielberg. Arestrup was also a theater director and appeared successfully on stage himself.

Niels Arestrup

(Bild: APA Pool/AFP/Bertrand GUAY)

Magnetic presence in front of the camera
France's Culture Minister Rachida Dati paid tribute to Arestrup on X as a great actor: he had impressed Jacques Audiard, Bertrand Tavernier, Julian Schnabel and Albert Dupontel with the strength of his performance and his magnetic presence in front of the camera. He will be remembered as one of the greatest actors.

Arestrup was born on February 8, 1949 near Paris to a father of Danish descent and a French mother. He discovered his passion for acting at an early age. He studied at renowned acting schools in Paris.