The film legend has died at the age of 88 following a battle with ill health, his three children told AFP in a statement on August 18th. We look back at five of of his standout performances: 'Purple Noon' (1960) Delon, then a 24-year-old dreamboat, captivated cinemagoers as the charming anti-hero Tom Ripley in an adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's famous suspense novel, "The Talented Mr. Ripley".
He played a charismatic conman who kills a wealthy friend with an oar on his yacht and takes his identity, setting off a spiral of sociopathic deception. Called "Plein Soleil" (Full Sun) in French, the deep blue of the dazzling Mediterranean was a fitting frame for the bronzed Adonis Delon, announcing the arrival of a new star. 'Rocco and his Brothers' (1960) Delon confirmed his talent and status as a screen pin-up later that year as the troubled Rocco in Luchino Visconti's neo-realist masterpiece, which won the Silver Lion at the Venice film festival.
Although Italian censors cut some violent scenes, Delon was both stunning and heartbreaking in this story of his doomed love for a young prostitute in grim post-war Milan. 'The Leopard' (1963) Again with the Italian master Visconti at the helm, Delon starred alongside Burt Lancaster in the screen version of Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa's classic novel charting the decline of an Italian aristocratic family in the 1860s. It won the Palme d'Or at Cannes with its epic ballroom scene ensuring its place -- and Delon's -- in film history.
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