Delbonnel was born in Nancy, Meurthe-et-Moselle, France and graduated in 1978 from the ESEC (Paris, Île-de-France).
He has collaborated twice with fellow French director Jean-Pierre Jeunet for Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain and A Very Long Engagement. He was the director of photography for the 2007 film Across the Universe and the 2009 fantasy-adventure film Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. He worked on Tim Burton's 2012 film Dark Shadows, and with The Coen Brothers on their 2013 film