Louis Malle, one of the most talented and controversial film directors of the 20th century, was drawn to taboos as surely as kids are drawn to flames and trouble. Though a contemporary of François Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard, he never wasted a moment being a critic, and was therefore not considered a member of the nouvelle vague. His wealthy Northern French family’s fortune was founded on sugar beets; even today, their beautifully packaged, fancy La Perruche sugar cubes look hand-cut. His parents were not pleased that their brilliant youngest son wanted to become a film director instead of running the family business, so to placate them, Malle enrolled at the Paris institute of advanced cinematographic studies, known as l’IDHEC, to get a degree.
He was gifted, and lucky. He dropped out at 21 to intern as an underwater cameraman for the oceanographer Jacques Cousteau on the documentary The Silent World, learned to edit film so well that he earned credit as co-director, and was only 23 when Cousteau gracefully shared his prizes for The Silent World with him—the Cannes Palme d’Or and the best-documentary Oscar.