Louis Leterrier

Louis Leterrier is a French-born director and producer who has become a specialist in high-concept action and superhero movies. After breaking into the filmmaking business off of his cinema degree from NYU’s Tisch School with a gig assisting director Jean-Pierre Jeunet on Alien Resurrection (1997), Leterrier returned to France and joined the filmmaking stable of producer-director Luc Besson, working on commercials and serving as assistant director on Besson’s The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (1999) and Alain Chabat’s smash hit sequel, Asterix & Obelix: Mission Cleopatra (2002).

Leterrier’s debut directorial credit (in European and ex-U.S. releases) was The Transporter (2002), starring Jason Statham and with Corey Yuen credited as an action director. For his first feature as a single director, Louis Leterrier directed action-martial arts superstar Jet Li in Unleashed (2005), written and produced by Besson but failing at the box office. Besson hired Leterrier as director of the sequel, Transporter 2 (2005), again written and produced by Besson and starring Statham, grossing a robust $89 million globally.

Breaking away from the Besson stable, Leterrier directed the second feature in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Incredible Hulk (2008), starring Edward Norton, Liv Tyler, Tim Roth, William Hurt, and Tim Blake Nelson, and grossing ($265 million) double costs ($137 million). A different kind of superhero movie, based on the Greek myth of Perseus, was Leterrier’s next directing assignment—the critically lambasted but commercially successful Clash of the Titans (2010), starring Sam Worthington, Gemma Arterton, Mads Mikkelsen, Ralph Fiennes, and Liam Neeson, and grossing $493 million worldwide.

A bigger hit for Louis Leterrier was his next movie as director, the hit heist comedy-drama, Now You See Me (2013), with Jesse Eisenberg, Mark Ruffalo, Isla Fisher, Melanie Laurent, Morgan Freeman, Woody Harrelson, Michael Caine, and Common, earning five times $75 million costs with a $351 million return. Taking a break from big-profile projects, director Leterrier collaborated with star-writer-producer Sasha Baron Cohen on the spy comedy, Grimsby (2016), with Cohen, Mark Strong, Isla Fisher, Rebel Wilson, and Penelope Cruz, and proved to be a box-office bomb with a poor $28 million take.

After his only French-made movie (2022’s The Takedown, on Netflix), Louis Leterrier directed the massive $340 million-budgeted tenth entry in the Fast & Furious franchise, Fast X (2023), starring Vin Diesel, Jason Momoa, Tyrese Gibson, Michelle Rodriguez, and Chris “Ludacris” Bridges; Leterrier was also director of the follow-up, Fast X: Part 2 (2025). On the producer side, Leterrier is a producer (with Phil Lord and Christopher Miller) on the 2023 comedy, Strays, directed and co-produced by Josh Greenbaum and starring Will Ferrell and Jamie Foxx.