His name is David Belle. He is the guy we saw in the movie District B13 doing some awesome action, jumps and altogether parkour. And I found out just now that I shouldn't have been surprised. He is known as the FOUNDER OF PARKOUR. His gymnastic abilities are awesome. He had military training, gymnastic training and martial arts training.
David Belle was born and raised in Fécamp, France. He descends from a modest family in the suburbs of Paris. His grandfather, father, and brother have been highly skilled rescuers in the French military fire service. In 1990, at the age of 17, Belle left school and moved to Lisses, Paris to begin his national service . In this time he obtained his French national First Aid certificate and UFOLEP certificate of gymnastics leadership. He made close friends with a group of teenagers with a similar physical passion, who later became the Yamakasi (Yann Hnautra, Frédéric Hnautra, David Balgogne, Sébastien Foucan and Kazuma). After joining the fire brigade with aspirations of following in his father's and grandfather's footsteps, he was temporarily discharged due to a wrist injury and did not return for personal reasons.
He later joined the Troupes de marine in Vannes, where he received a promotion, a gymnastic agility certificate of honour, and champion records for Regimental rope-climbing (which his father had once held) and the Essonne obstacle course. He has however said that his taste and love for adventure and freedom did not go well with the regimented life of the military.
Upon completing his national service, he worked in various professions including a warehouse worker, security guard and furniture salesman. He then flew to India and obtained a Black Belt in Kung Fu.
After his return he began promoting his discipline by filming footage of his capabilities. In 1997 the Stage 2 team (Francis Marroto, Pierre Sled and Pierre Salviac, Georges Kanellitsas) were shown a video and decided to create a film about Belle and parkour, in a series of his collaborations with 'the speed-air man', 'catmen', 'la Relève' and 'les traceurs'.
Belle was first introduced to his acting career in a meeting with Hubert Koundé (La Haine), in order to discuss the success of parkour on the big screen. He then began developing his acting ability with the play Pygmalion, and has since been successful in obtaining a number of roles mostly in French films and promotions.
Belle has been featured in promotional videos for Tina Turner, and Iam. He has starred in "Les gens du voyages" and "Un monde meilleur", followed by "L'Engrenages" and "Femme Fatale", as well as "Les rivières pourpres 2", starring Jean Reno. After filming several more advertisements and promotions for the BBC, Nissan, Canon, and Nike, Belle was contacted by Luc Besson (director of Nikita, and The Fifth Element) regarding co-starring as lead actor with Cyril Raffaelli in the action movie District B13(more), followed by the sequel District 13: Ultimatum(more).
David Belle says ..."All these people here, they come and they want me to do big things, expect me to do big drops so they can sell pictures, put it on their websites, whatever. But what is my motivation then? I could do this jump once and maybe get hurt, but even if I don't get hurt what is the point right here, right now? To make these people happy? If my family was over there and needed me, I wouldn't even hesitate. I would do it for them and thats who I train and do these things for. I'm not a monkey, I can't be treated like one. I don't understand how people want to put themselves into great risk for money. I've trained so long and hard for myself, to save people, to protect my family... People get into Parkour now just train in order to do risks for media, I just can't understand why they would do so. That was never the goal of Parkour. Money changes people, but that money cannot change my goal, my motivation or why I do this. I'm on tour now for you, I'm here talking to you so you can help others and that's how things work, never think it's the other way around. I'm doing this for you guys, to inspire you, that's it"
