French filmmaker and photographer Just Jaeckin, best known for his erotic film “Emmanuelle”, died on Tuesday at the age of 82, a family spokeswoman told AFP on Wednesday.
“Just Jaeckin, the director of ‘Emmanuelle’ with Sylvia Kristel, died on September 6 in Brittany due to a long illness, at the age of 82 (…) He died surrounded by his wife Anne, a sculptor, and their daughter Julia, photographer,” her agent said in a statement.
The film, released in 1974, had a great international success, from Japan to the United States, and tells of the sexual adventures of a young woman in Asia.
It was the highest-grossing film of the year in France, with close to 9 million viewers, and was on the Champs-Elysées in Paris for thirteen years.
A social phenomenon, the film was seen in theaters by tens of millions of viewers, and many more if you count other media.
“Emmanuelle” was an adaptation of an erotic bestseller of the same name, written by Emmanuelle Arsan in 1959.
The producer, Yves Rousset-Rouard, who wanted to entrust the project to a young director, commissioned Just Jaeckin, a photographer with no experience in feature films.
Just Jaeckin then filmed two other high-voltage sexual movies, “The Story of O” and “Lady Chatterley’s Lover,” again with Sylvia Kristel.
Born in 1940 in Vichy (centre), Just Jaeckin owned, together with his wife, an art gallery in Paris where they basically exhibited their own paintings and sculptures.
