Éric Serra's father Claude was a famous French songwriter in the 1950s and '60s. Because Claude worked on his music around his son Eric; he became aware of music when he was very young. Eric's mother had died when he was only seven years old. In the early 1980s, Serra had met Luc Besson. Besson was a movie director. Besson had asked Serra to write a score his first movie "Le Dernier Combat" (1983). Serra then began creating scores to most of Besson's movies.