The film director Claude Miller, who has died aged 70 after a long illness, was continually dogged by comparisons to his friend and mentor François Truffaut. Hardly a review of his films failed to mention Truffaut in some way or another. This came about for various reasons. Miller was Truffaut's production manager on several occasions and made subtle references to the older director's work in many of his own films, almost always mentioning him in interviews. He had a small role in Truffaut's L'Enfant Sauvage (The Wild Child, 1970) and adapted La Petite Voleuse (The Little Thief, 1988) from a 30-page screenplay that Truffaut had written a few years before his death.

When Truffaut was once asked whether he had started a school of directors, he denied it. "These people are more influenced by other directors than myself. If Claude Miller has points in common with me, it's more a question of affinity. For example, I share his liking for Bergman." Certainly, Miller shared Truffaut's desire to touch a large audience without sacrificing his soul, as well as a humanist attitude and a refusal to moralise, though Miller had a rather darker view of humanity.

If comparisons need be made to another director, then Claude Chabrol might serve as well. Like Chabrol, Miller's oeuvre is dominated by psychological thrillers, including adaptations of the English-language crime writers Patricia Highsmith (This Sweet Sickness, 1977), John Wainwright (Garde à Vue, 1981) and Ruth Rendell (Betty Fisher and Other Stories, 2001).

But it would be unfair to judge him only in the light of others, for his films can be appreciated on their own terms, thematically and stylistically. The typical Miller film has a central figure under a lot of pressure, either self-imposed or coming from others. His is a cruel universe, created with great sensitivity and handled with astonishing ease, fluidity and economy.

Claude Miller Claude Miller in 2007. The typical Miller film has a central figure under a lot of pressure. Photograph: Francois Lo Presti/AFP

Miller was born in Paris into a secular Jewish family from whom he drew some of the characters in his domestic drama Un Secret (2007), set during the second world war. Miller's father was a leftwing militant, his uncle escaped from Buchenwald. Aged 20, Miller entered IDHEC, the leading French film school. After military service, he was an assistant director on Robert Bresson's Au Hasard Balthazar (1966), Jacques Demy's Les Demoiselles de Rochefort (1967) and Jean-Luc Godard's Weekend (1967).

Dites-Lui Que Je l'Aime (This Sweet Sickness), starring Gérard Depardieu and Miou-Miou, both obsessed by unrequited amours fous, failed dismally with critics and the public. Miller then gave up directing for four years and made television commercials. He returned with a great success in Garde à Vue. Mostly confined to a room in a police station, it was a gripping, beautifully played cat-and-mouse thriller which focused on an inspector (Lino Ventura) questioning a suspect (Michel Serrault), who is accused of raping and murdering two little girls.

In Miller's film noir Mortelle Randonée (Deadly Circuit, 1983), Serrault was a private detective obsessed with Isabelle Adjani, whom he imagines as the grown-up version of his daughter. Miller managed to play on the theme of incest in a dryly humorous and subtle manner.

There followed what could be called his trilogy of female adolescence, starting with L'Effrontée (An Impudent Girl, 1985), starring a 14-year-old Charlotte Gainsbourg in her first main role, as a rebellious, vulnerable teen-ager seeking escape from her monotonous home life. Her misadventures are more painful and true than most rites-of-passage movies. Gainsbourg returned in La Petite Voleuse as a girl who longs for adulthood and freedom. L'Accompagnatrice (The Accompanist, 1992), which was also Miller's first period piece, was set in Nazi-occupied Paris and centres on the relationship between a young accompanist (Romane Bohringer) and an international opera star.

After the failure of La Sourire (The Smile, 1994), an eccentric, erotic fantasy, Miller returned with La Classe de Neige (Class Trip, 1998), another psychological thriller, set effectively against snowscapes, which won the jury prize at Cannes. La Petite Lili (2003) an elegant, updated version of Chekhov's The Seagull, gave a nod to Truffaut's Day for Night, for a film is being made of the play. Je Suis Heureux Que Ma Mère Soit Vivante (I'm Glad My Mother Is Alive, 2009) was co-written and co-directed with his son Nathan, mainly because of Miller's poor health. It turned out to be an intriguing drama of a troubled adopted teenager seeking his birth mother. Fortunately, Miller managed to complete his final film, Thérèse Desqueyroux, based on François Mauriac's novel, and starring Audrey Tautou in the title role.

The modest and softly-spoken Miller is survived by his film producer wife, Annie, and Nathan.

• Claude Miller, film director, born 20 February 1942; died 4 April 2012

Ronald Bergan
guardian.co.uk