Actor Seriously Injured in Paris Motorcycle Crash

He has undergone surgery for ankle, leg, and pelvis injuries.

By Ashley Turner

Mathieu Kassovitz, a French actor and director, is in a "worrying" condition following a motorbike accident in the greater Paris area on Sunday, according to authorities. A police source told Agence France-Presse that the 56-year-old actor, who was best known for his role in the 1995 film La Haine and his role in the 2001 film Amélie, was taking a motorcycle training course at the time of the accident.

According to French media, the actor was preparing for a role in an upcoming movie when he was "very seriously injured," as he was reportedly suffering head trauma and a fractured pelvis as a result of his injuries. One of his daughters, who was riding behind him with an instructor on a motorcycle, witnessed the accident, Le Parisien reported. Kassovitz has been transported to the Kremlin-Bicêtre hospital, according to French authorities in Essonne, south of the capital of France. 

People close to him told AFP Monday that Kassovitz has undergone surgery for injuries to his ankle, leg, and pelvis. "The operations went well," said Peter Kassovitz, the actor's father and a Hungarian-born director, in a statement released by his agent. "Mathieu will begin a normal process of healing, rest, and returning to fitness." Kassovitz, according to people close to him, was wearing a helmet at the time of the accident and did not sustain any head injuries as a result. Local prosecutors and police have launched an investigation into the cause of the accident.

According to his comments on a motoring program on French television in 2019, Kassovitz told the audience that he had perceived himself more as an intellectual than a sportsman but had acquired a passion for motorbikes later in life after getting his license at the age of 40 and immediately using large motorcycles. As he told the program on RMC Découverte: "I like machines, I like the technicality of managing to handle them." 

During his youth, Kassovitz wrote and directed the film La Haine at age 27. The film is about three men in Paris, played by Vincent Cassel, Hubert Koundé, and Saïd Taghmaoui, who are followed over a period of 24 hours after a Paris riot. This movie won Kassovitz the Cannes Film Festival award for the best director award. Moreover, this film won the César Award for Best Film, the French equivalent of the Oscars.

The film Rebellion, which he starred in and directed in 2011, is based on a true story about French commandos clashing with tribes in New Caledonia, the Melanesian territory of France. Kassovitz has played a range of roles, including the love interest Nino in Amélie, a Mossad explosives expert in Steven Spielberg's Munich, and more recently as the lead in the French spy thriller series The Bureau, which was a worldwide hit. In his latest film, Visions, he portrays the husband of Diane Kruger, who plays an airline pilot who begins an affair with her ex-girlfriend. The film premiered at the Angoulême Francophone Film Festival two weeks ago.

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