Jean-Jacques Annaud was born on 1 October 1943 in Draveil, Juvisy-sur-Orge, Essonne, in France. He was educated at the technical school in Vaugirard, and in 1964 graduated from the prestigious film school Institut des Hautes Études Cinématographiques (IDHEC) in Paris.

He then adapted The Bear P.O.V. (César for Best Director, 1988) in the heart of select locations of the Dolomites, Germany, Canada and Austria. He then shot in Vietnam the adaptation of Marguerite Duras’s autobiographical novel, The Lover (1992), recreating the atmosphere of colonial Indochina. He then set back out to the Canadian Rockies and directed Wings of Courage, the first 3D fiction film ever made in Imax-3D (1995). In 2000 he wrote and produced Running Free, directed by Sergei Bodrov.

Annaud also worked with Brad Pitt when he directed Seven Years in Tibet (1997), shot in Argentina, Canada, Tibet, Nepal and Tyrol. In 2001, Annaud reunited Jude Law and Ed Harris in the hell of the famed battle of Stalingrad (Enemy at the Gates, 2001), completely reconstructed in Germany. Soon after, Annaud flew to the ruins of the temples of Angkor and gave life to Two Brothers (2004), the shooting taking place in Cambodia, Thailand and France. The filmmaker then set out to revive ancient Greece (His Majesty Minor, 2007,) shot entirely in Spain, then Arabia of the late 1930s, directing Antonio Banderas in Tunisia and Qatar in Black Gold (2011). In 2015, Annaud adapted Wolf Totem, a Chinese literary phenomenon entirely shot in Inner Mongolia. A global triumph, the film won the People’s Hundred Flowers Award and Golden Rooster in China and a dozen other trophies around the world.

In 2018, Annaud directed Patrick Dempsey in his 10-part television adaptation of Joël Dicker’s best-seller The Truth about the Harry Quebert Affair (2018); it was released in 22 countries and shot in Canada.