Crowds line Saint-Tropez streets for Brigitte Bardot funeral

Crowds lined the streets of Saint-Tropez for the funeral of French film legend Brigitte Bardot on Wednesday.

Some of those gathered were seen applauding as her coffin was driven through the French Riviera town after a service in a local church.

Among the guests at the service were far-right politician Marine le Pen and Equality Minister Aurore Bergé, who like Bardot, is a defender of animal rights. The actress was later buried at a hillside cemetery overlooking the Mediterranean.

Bardot, who revolutionised 1950s French cinema and became a symbol of sexual liberation, died of cancer aged 91 three days after Christmas.

Bardot had left instructions that her funeral be conducted without fanfare or ostentation – but the people of Saint-Tropez wanted to pay her a proper adieu on Wednesday.

Screens were set up in the small fishing town that was transformed by Bardot’s fame into a playground for the jet set.

Bardot’s only son Nicolas-Jacques Charrier was among those carrying the coffin to the cemetery where the actress’ parents and first husband Roger Vadim are buried.

After her death, French President Emmanuel Macron said the nation was mourning “a legend of the century”, while the Brigitte Bardot Foundation remembered her as a “world-renowned actress”.

The cinema icon – “BB” as she was known in her home country – acted in almost 50 films, including And God Created Woman, but retired in 1973 to devote her life to animal welfare.

Later in life, Bardot’s reputation was damaged after she made homophobic slurs and was fined multiple times for inciting racial hatred.

Her right-wing views alienated her from many in the political establishment.