Ladj Ly

Ladj Ly (French pronunciation: [ladʒ li]; born 19 March 1980 in Paris) is a French film director and screenwriter. He won a Jury Prize in Cannes Film Festival for Les Misérables in 2019. The film was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film.^[1]

Ladj Ly
Born	(1980-03-19) 19 March 1980 (age 45)
Nationality	French
Occupation	Film director Screenwriter
Notable work	Les Misérables

Biography

Ly's parents are from Mali and he grew up in Montfermeil, a district of Bosquets. He started making films with his friends Kim Chapiron, Romain Gavras, and JR, in the collective Kourtrajmé.^[2]

He directed his first films, notably for Oxmo Puccino, and his first documentaries, 365 jours à Clichy-Montfermeil [fr] (365 days in Clichy-Montfermeil), filmed after the 2005 French riots; Go Fast Connexion; and 365 jours au Mali (365 days in Mali).

In 2011, Ly was given a three-year prison sentence for kidnapping and false imprisonment.^[3][4] In 2012, the sentence was reduced on appeal to two years imprisonment, and one year suspended sentence.^[5]

Les Misérables is the first non-documentary film he directed.^[6] The film received many awards, notably at the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival and a nomination for the César Award for Best Short Film in 2018. In the same year, he was nominated for the César Award for Best Documentary Film for À voix haute : La Force de la parole [fr] with Stéphane de Freitas [fr].^[7][8][9]

In 2018 in Montfermeil, Ly created a free film school, called "L'école Kourtrajmé".^[10]

With co-writers Alexis Manenti and Giordano Gederlini, he won the Lumières Award for Best Screenplay,^[11] and was nominated for the César Award for Best Original Screenplay^[12] and the European Film Award for Best Screenwriter,^[13] for the 2019 feature film version of Les Misérables.

His second feature film, Les Indésirables, premiered at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival on September 8, 2023.^[14]