Born in Kiev, Jovovich immigrated with her parents to the United States when she was five. In 1987, she began modeling at the age of 12 when Herb Ritts photographed her for the cover of the Italian magazine Lei.[3][4] Richard Avedon featured her in Revlon's "Most Unforgettable Women in the World" advertisements.[5] In 1988, Jovovich had her first acting role in the television film The Night Train to Kathmandu, and that year also appeared in her first feature film, Two Moon Junction.
Jovovich gained attention for her role in the explicit 1991 romance film Return to the Blue Lagoon, as she was then only 15.[6] She was considered to have a breakthrough with her role in the 1997 French science-fiction film The Fifth Element written and directed by Luc Besson. She and Besson married that year, but soon divorced. She starred as the heroine and martyr in Besson's The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (1999).