Simon Abkarian
Date of birth: 1962-03-05
Place of birth: Gonesse, Val d'Oise, France
Known for: Acting
Also known as: Simone Abkarian
Biography
Simon Abkarian (born 5 March 1962) is a French-Armenian actor. Born in Gonesse, Val d'Oise, of Armenian descent, Abkarian spent his childhood in Lebanon. He moved to Los Angeles, where he joined an Armenian theater company managed by Gerald Papazian. He returned to France in 1985, settling in Paris. He took classes at the Acting International school, then he joined Ariane Mnouchkine's Théâtre du Soleil. Abkarian left the Théâtre du Soleil in 1993 and played in 2001 "Beast on the Moon" by Richard Kalinoski, directed by Irina Brook, a play about the life of a survivor of the Genocide of the Armenians, a role which won him critical acclaims and the Molière of the best comedian. His first roles in cinema were proposed by French filmaker Cédric Klapisch, who asked him to play in several of his movies, notably in "Chacun cherche son chat" ("When the Cat is Away" (1996) and in "Ni pour, ni contre (bien au contraire)" en 2003. He was featured in Sally Potter's Yes (2004), in which he played the lead role. Abkarian then played Mehdi Ben Barka in the thriller "J'ai vu tuer Ben Barka" by Serge Le Péron, about the kidnapping and the murder of the leader of the Moroccan opposition. He then played in "Prendre Femme" by Ronit Elkabetz which won him several interpretation prizes. Playing different roles and in different genres, he was featured in the adventure "Zaïna, cavalière de l'Atlas" by Bourlem Guerdjou, in the comedy "Le Démon de midi" by Marie-Pascale Osterriet. He has also appeared in Atom Egoyan's Ararat (2002), he was Albert in Almost Peaceful (2004) by French Director Michel Deville a film about Holocaust survivors, he was featured in "Your Dreams" (2005) by Denis Thybaud. He played the role of villain Alex Dimitrios in the James Bond film, Casino Royale. The character is a Government contractor and arms dealer working against Bond. He was featured as Sahak in the thriller "Les Mauvais Joueurs" ("The Gamblers") (2007) by Frédéric Balekdjian. He has also been the voice of Ebi in the French version of the animated feature "Persepolis". Abkarian played the role of the eminent Armenian poet Missak Manouchianin in "Army of Crime" (2010) by Robert Guédiguian, a French filmaker based in Marseilles, who is also of Armenian parentage. He has also played Dariush Bakhshi, the Iranian Special Consul, in the BBC drama Spooks MI-5. Abkarian is known for his intensity in acting and for his ecclectism in the roles he choses. Description above from the Wikipedia article Simon Abkarian, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia .
Movie Credits
Trivial
2007-05-23
An inspector who just suffered a family tragedy is looking for a missing older man. Man's family is
Persepolis
2007-06-27
In 1970s Iran, Marjane 'Marji' Satrapi watches events through her young eyes and her idealistic fami
The Snake
2006-10-21
A ruthless gang led by private detective Joseph Plender is extorting rich people and famous fashion
Army of Crime
2009-09-16
This gripping historical drama recounts the story of Armenian-born Missak Manouchian, a woodworker a
To Take A Wife
2004-06-01
The story takes place in Haifa, Israel, in 1979, during three days before the Shabbat. A young woman
When the Cat's Away
1996-04-03
When Chloe, a young Parisian, decides to take a long-overdue vacation, she has to find someone to lo
Not For, or Against (Quite the Contrary)
2003-03-05
"Ni Pour, Ni Contre" tracks the fall of a young TV camerawoman, Caty, after she becomes involved wit
Yes
2005-08-05
She is a scientist. He is a Lebanese doctor. They meet at a banquet and fall into a carefree, passio
The Seven Days
2008-05-05
The Ohaion family is mourning the death of one of their relatives. In keeping with tradition, they g
Permis de construire
2021-11-15
When his father passes away, a dentist in Paris inherits a plot and the will to build a house on it.
Rage
2009-09-24
A schoolboy uses his cellphone camera to shoot intimate interviews with people working at a New York
Overdose
2022-11-04
Captain Sara Bellaiche, from Toulouse Judiciary Police branch, is investigating a go-fast linked to
Off-Season
2021-11-26
A seaside resort in the middle of winter, with its abandoned beach bars and rain-battered alleys, ca
Casino Royale
2006-11-14
Le Chiffre, a banker to the world's terrorists, is scheduled to participate in a high-stakes poker g
Almost Peaceful
2002-12-18
Set during the largely unexplored period immediately following World War II, the film follows a grou
Turk's Head
2010-03-31
A 14 year old boy, an ER doctor, a cop looking for revenge, a mother fighting for her children and a
Black Notebooks
2021-07-07
With this two-part feature documentary, Shlomi Elkabetz shares a poignant love letter to his sister,
Ararat
2002-05-20
Interrogated by a customs officer, a young man recounts how his life was changed during the making o
Secrets of State
2008-12-10
In France, terrorist groups and intelligence agencies battle in a merciless war everyday, in the nam
The Wedding Song
2008-11-24
The Nazi occupation of Tunisia strains the bonds of friendship between a Muslim woman and a Sephardi
Restless
2022-02-25
After going to extremes to cover up an accident, a corrupt cop's life spirals out of control when he
Armenia
2006-06-28
This is a story about returning to ones ancestral homeland. Anna is a cardiologist who discovers her
Les mauvais joueurs
2005-04-20
Paris, the Sentier district. Christmas is approaching and Vahé Krikorian's life is falling apart. Th
Zarafa
2012-01-25
Inspired by the true story of the first giraffe to visit France, Zarafa is a sumptuously animated an
The Demon Stirs
2005-06-22
Anne Cestac accepts the obvious: her husband Julien, in his forties, has fallen madly in love with a
Force
2011-10-26
Following a series of unsolved robberies, the authorities decide to give carte blanche to commander
The Way to Happiness
2022-06-15
Saul escaped the coming Shoah as a child by being sent from Vienna to Brussels by a Kindertransport.
Aram
2002-11-27
Aram, an ex-soldier from the Armenian cause, has come to France to close an arms deal under secret s
Les Amants naufragés
2011-06-13
Stan Mirkine would have everything to be happy. Now, he is sure of it: his wife is cheating on him.
De Gaulle – Partie 2
Part two of a two-part biopic following French army officer Charles De Gaulle's life and political c
De Gaulle - Partie 1 : La France Libre
Part one of a two-part biopic following French army officer Charles De Gaulle's life and political c
The Silence of Rak
1997-07-09
The adventures of Rak, who after his dismissal begins to reflect on the meaning of the word work and
Angélique
2013-12-18
The incredible destiny of Angélique: a beautiful girl who found in her love for Joffrey Peyrac the s
Lila Lili
1999-01-06
Micheline, who is pregnant, lives in a home for women from which she tries to observe the world with
Qu'est-ce qu'on va faire de toi?
2012-12-19
The young years of Michel Drucker.
Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem
2014-06-25
The trial story of Viviane Amsalem's five year fight to obtain her divorce in front of the only lega
Ana El Awan
1994-01-02
Camille is a composer going back to his homeland Lebanon to write a song about his country. Raya is
The 4th Wall
2025-01-15
Lebanon, 1982. To keep a promise made to an old friend, Georges, an idealistic theater director, tra
Zaina: Rider of the Atlas
2005-10-26
Young Zaina, must lead a caravan of precious thoroughbreds to Marrakech to take part of the most pre
God Will Know His Own
After a long journey through the circuit of international Islamism that took him from France to Lond
The Cut
2014-10-16
In 1915 a man survives the Armenian genocide in the Ottoman Empire, but loses his family, speech and
Colt 45
2014-08-06
Vincent Miles, a gunsmith and shooting instructor at the National Police, is an expert in combat sho
I Saw Ben Barka Get Killed
2005-11-02
January 1966. In a Paris apartment, police discovers the corpse of Georges Figon, the man who broke
Mémoires de Palestine
2023-12-19
1915
2015-04-17
Exactly 100 years after the Armenian Genocide, a theatre director stages a play to bring the ghosts
Don't Tell Me the Boy Was Mad
2015-11-11
Aram, a young man from Marseille of Armenian origin, blows up the Turkish ambassador's car in Paris.
Comme une ombre
2010-12-21
S.A.C. : Des hommes dans l'ombre
2005-11-29
New Délire
2007-07-04
Take a Bollywood film--a good Bolllywood film--with action, emotion, suspense, and laughter. With In
The Legend of Princess Parva
2003-02-12
The island of Kiam was once a paradise place with a kind Maharaja as a ruler. But one day the villai
A World of Ours
2008-07-16
Noé comes into sixth grade at the same time he discovers a new city and a new house where he has jus
Il était une fois... « Le procès de Viviane Amsalem »
2016-11-29
The final part of a family trilogy by Ronit and Shlomi Elkabetz. It follows Viviane Amsalem's grueli
Chroniques d'un indic
2025-08-28
Minor Revelations
2008-04-09
"The choice of each period is intimate, as each period awakens a particular emotion in me. This emot
J'irai au paradis car l'enfer est ici
1997-10-01
In this French gangster drama, a young hoodlum, new to his famed father's dubious profession, succes
Overdrive
2017-06-16
Master car thieves square off against French gangsters in the South of France with money, women and
J'ai tué ma femme
2017-02-04
Max and Minou are having a relationship crisis: she's crying, he's getting annoyed. Their car has be
Journey from Greece
2017-08-09
Djam, a young Greek woman, is sent to Istanbul by her uncle Kakourgos, a former sailor with a passio
Chouf
2016-10-05
Chouf: It means “look” in Arabic, but it is also the name of the watchmen in the drug cartels of Mar
In Your Dreams
2005-04-13
Ninth is a promising young rapper whose reputation does not exceed even the few streets of his neigh
The Sonata
2018-11-15
After a gifted musician inherits a mansion after her long lost father dies under mysterious circumst
Scribe
2016-10-19
Two years after a burn-out, Duval is still unemployed. Contacted by an enigmatic businessman, he is
Cyrano, My Love
2018-11-10
Paris, France, December 1897. The young playwright Edmond Rostand feels like a failure. Inspiration
Rebels
2019-01-17
Sandra, a young woman forced to leave the south of France to flee a violent husband. Without attachm
The Audition
2019-11-06
Anna teaches violin at a music school, her husband is an instrument-maker. They have a 10-year-old s
Someone, Somewhere
2019-09-11
Rémy and Mélanie live next door to each other in Paris but have never met. The two thirty-year-old P
The Swallows of Kabul
2019-09-04
Summer 1998—Kabul under Taliban rule. Zunaira and Mohsen are young and in love. Despite the daily vi
Ce soir-là et les jours d'après
2019-06-26
On the night of November 13, 2015, a woman who lives behind the Bataclan and a man who happens to pa
The Truth About Charlie
2002-10-25
Regina meets charming Joshua while vacationing in Martinique, as she contemplates ending her whirlwi
Le Menteur : La Pièce !
2008-11-20
L'Affaire Ben Barka
2008-01-21
Tempest in a Teapot
1997-12-10
American actor-director Arnold Barkus made this low-budget French film, a comedy set in New York, wi
Rendition
2007-09-07
When an Egyptian terrorism suspect "disappears" on a flight from Africa to Washington DC, his Americ
The Marchers
2013-11-27
In 1983, in France experiencing intolerance and racial violence , three young teens and the priest M
Le dernier jour du jeûne
2020-12-17
Les Damnés de la Commune
2021-03-16
Exclusively created with period engravings, this animated feature explores the Franco-Prussian War o
Le Poisson rouge
1994-01-01
Tehlirian on Trial: Armenia's Avenger
2015-04-28
On 15 March 1921, Talat Pasha, a high-ranking Turkish dignitary, was shot dead in a Berlin street by
Khamsa
2008-10-08
After fleeing from his foster family, 11-years-old Khamsa returns to the gypsy camp where he was bor
A Day at the Museum
2008-11-19
Un conservateur terrorisé par les plantes vertes, une mère plastifiée pour être exposée, un ballet d
Cop Goes Missing
2022-02-23
One morning, a worn-out field cop, nicknamed Ping-Pong by everyone, burns his police ID and disappea
Electre des bas-fonds
2022-05-01
Le lièvre
Playground
A lonely teenage girl joins a school for promising killers and trains hard to become an professional
La nuit miraculeuse
1989-12-13
To celebrate the bicentennial of the French revolution, an exposition of mannequins representing the