photo via The British Film Institute
Without Jean-Paul Belmondo, The French New Wave film revolution -la Nouvelle Vague- never reaches so far around the globe. Never touches every single part of 1960's Popular Culture. In Belmondo, an actor with enormous magnetism, savoir-faire, and a particularly Gallic strand of studied nonchalance, he becomes the de facto New Wave Ambassador, and the very face of what was (and was not) cool, dark, and even slightly threatening.
And always, in every film, he is eminently watchable!
Belmondo becomes that most magical of all entertainers: he is #sublime.
Belmondo becomes both his very own brand, as well as representing a certain style of dramatic acting, AND in the process, becomes a representation of a certain way of thinking, living, and of film-making.
And he is always, for both good and bad, France personified.
A cool France that has ideas and feelings uniquely its own, not American or British.
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It wasn't until I was living and working in Washington, #DC in the 1990's and could actually see great prints of French 
and Italian 
#NewWave films at the National Gallery of Art main building on weekends when I wasn't up in Baltimore for an Orioles ballgame or at home or sports bar watching a football or basketball game.
The NGA was one of my favorite social haunts, and there, I could watch and absorb films I'd never been able to see in a theatre while growing up in #SoFL.
It was in those moments when one of Belmondo's films was being shown in a packed theatre that all the dozens of New Wave articles and books I'd read over the years while in Bloomington, Chicago, Evanston and DC -and learning French!- all made sense when #Belmondo entered a scene.
Then, all of the dots were connected! 
A tribute will be paid to Belmondo in the next issue of Cahiers du cinema magazine.
Sans Jean-Paul Belmondo, la révolution cinématographique française de la Nouvelle Vague -la Nouvelle Vague- n'atteindrait jamais aussi loin le globe. Ne touche jamais à chaque partie de la culture populaire des années 1960. Dans Belmondo, acteur au magnétisme énorme, au savoir-faire et au brin particulièrement gaulois d'une nonchalance étudiée, il devient de facto l'ambassadeur de la Nouvelle Vague, et le visage même de ce qui était (et n'était pas) cool, sombre, et même légèrement menaçant. Et toujours, dans chaque film, il est éminemment regardable !
Belmondo devient le plus magique de tous les artistes : il est #sublime.
Belmondo devient à la fois sa propre marque, tout en représentant un certain style de jeu dramatique, ET dans le processus, devient une représentation d'une certaine façon de penser, de vivre et de faire des films.
Et il est toujours, en bien comme en mal, la France incarnée.
Une France cool qui a des idées et des sentiments qui lui sont propres, pas américains ou britanniques.
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