Born in 1980, Ladj Ly was quickly attracted to cinema. In the mid-1990s, he joined the Kourtrajmé collective, where he made a number of music videos and making-of films, as well as his first short films, Montfermeil les Bosquets (1997) and Go Fast Connection (2008). After the riots that took place in Paris suburbs in 2005, Ly decided to film his neighbourhood for a year, which resulted in the documentary 365 jours à Clichy-Montfermeil (2007). His first feature-length film, Les Misérables (2019), was selected for the Festival de Cannes, where it won the Jury Prize.