Louis Malle  Louis Marie Malle (; 30 October 1932 – 23 November 1995) was a French film director, screenwriter and producer. His film "Le Monde du silence" won the Palme d'Or in 1956 and the Academy Award for Best Documentary in 1957, although he was not credited at the ceremony; the award was instead presented to the film's co-director Jacques Cousteau. Later in his career he was nominated multiple times for Academy Awards. Malle is also one of only four directors to have won the Golden Lion twice. Malle worked in both French cinema and Hollywood, and he produced both French and English language films. His most famous films include the crime film "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" (1958), the World War II drama "Lacombe, Lucien" (1974), the romantic crime film "Atlantic City" (1980), the comedy-drama "My Dinner with Andre" (1981), and the autobiographical film "Au revoir les enfants" (1987). Malle was born into a wealthy industrialist family in Thumeries, Nord, France, the son of Francoise (Béghin) and Pierre Malle. During World War II, Malle attended a Roman Catholic boarding school near Fontainebleau. As an 11-year-old he witnessed a Gestapo raid on the school, in which three Jewish students, including his close friend, and a Jewish teacher were rounded up and deported to Auschwitz. The school's headmaster, Père Jacques, was arrested for harboring them and sent to the concentration camp at Mauthausen. Malle would later address these events in his autobiographical film "Au revoir les enfants" (1987). As a young man, Malle initially studied political science at Sciences Po before turning to film studies at IDHEC. He worked as the co-director and cameraman to Jacques Cousteau on the documentary "The Silent World" (1956), which won an Oscar and the Palme d'Or at the 1956 Academy Awards and Cannes Film Festival respectively. He assisted Robert Bresson on "A Man Escaped" (French title: "Un condamné à mort s'est échappé ou Le vent souffle où il veut", 1956) before making his first feature, "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" in 1957 (released in the U.K. as "Lift to the Scaffold" and in the U.S. originally as "Frantic", later as "Elevator to the Gallows").