29 December 2019

German Film Actors of the 21th Century

A few weeks ago, we bought a series of photos with signatures of German actors. Postcards of modern stars are scarce, but in Germany the 'autogrammkarte' remains a popular fad. This gives us the chance to do a a post on German film actors, who are working now in Germany and abroad. Some are known internationally, like Sebastian Koch, Moritz Bleibtreu and David Kross. Other, like the young Aaron Altaras, will become known soon, we predict. Don't mail us if you miss someone (Where's Christoph Waltz? Why not Daniël Brühl?). It's not a complete or definitive overview of the German film actors of the 21th Century. It's a glimpse, and in alphabetical order. And yes, we will do a female version in 2020.

Aaron Altaras
German autograph card, 2018.

Aaron Altaras
German autograph card, 2019.

Aaron Altaras (1995) is one of the most promising German actors of his generation. Altaras had his breakthrough as a teenager in the TV film Nicht alle waren Mörder/Not all were murderers (Jo Baier, 2006), with Nadja Uhl and Hannelore Elsner. As a young adult, he appeared in two interesting films. The first was Die Unsichtbaren/The Invisibles (2017) about four young Jews who learned to hide in plain sight in Berlin during the war. The other is the Swiss romantic drama Mario (2018), about two young football players who get caught up between the politics of the game and the politics of love. His next project is the Mini-series Unorthodox (2020).

Moritz Bleibtreu
German autograph card. Photo: Christian Schoppe.

Moritz Bleibtreu (1971) is a German actor, whose notable roles include Manni in Lola rennt/Run Lola Run (1998), Tarek Fahd in the psychological thriller Das Experiment/The Experiment (2001) and Andreas Baader in Der Baader Meinhof Komplex/The Baader Meinhof Complex (2008). More recently, he starred in the comedy Es war einmal in Deutschland.../Bye Bye Germany (2017) and the drama Roads (2019).

August Diehl
German autograph card.

August Diehl
German autograph card.

German actor August Diehl (1976) is primarily known to international audiences as Gestapo major Dieter Hellstrom in Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds (2009) and as Michael "Mike" Krause, Angelina Jolie's boyfriend, in Salt (2010). He also played leading roles in Die Fälscher/The Counterfeiters (2007), Le jeune Karl Marx/The Young Karl Marx (2017), and Terrence Malick's A Hidden Life (2019).

Vinzenz Kiefer
German autograph card.

German actor Vinzenz Kiefer (1979) is best known for his role as police detective Alexander Brandt in the Krimi series Alarm für Cobra 11 - Die Autobahnpolizei/Cobra 11 (2009-2015), as well as that of Christian Dassault in the action thriller Jason Bourne (2016) with Matt Damon. Next, he can be seen in the Czech historical action drama Medieval (2019) with Ben Foster and Michael Caine.

Sebastian Koch
German autograph card.

Sebastian Koch
German autograph card. Photo: Mathias Bothor.

Sebastian Koch (1962) is one of Germany s most multi-faceted and successful television and film actors. He is known for roles in the Academy Award-winning film Leben der Anderen/The Lives of Others (2007), Paul Verhoeven’s Zwartboek/Black Book (2006), Steven Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies (2015), and as Otto Düring in the fifth season of the TV series Homeland (2015-2016). Recently he could be seen in Werk ohne Autor/Never Look Away (2018) with Tom Schilling, and in the Television adaptation of Umberto Eco's novel The Name of the Rose (2019) with John Turturro and Rupert Everett. Announced is the Canadian series Shadowplay (2020), in which he will star with Nina Hoss.

David Kross
German autograph card.

David Kross
German autograph card.

David Kross
German autograph card.

German actor David Kross (1990) played Michael Berg in the critically acclaimed film The Reader (2008) with Kate Winslet. Kross has since worked in both German and English speaking films, including Steven Spielberg's War Horse (2011), Into the White (Petter Næss, 2012) and Race (Stephen Hopkins, 2016). A recent success was the German thriller Ballon/Balloon (2018) with Friedrich Mücke. In post-production is the comedy Betonrausch/Concrete Gold (2020), with Frederick Lau.

Friedrich Mücke
German autograph card. Photo: Alan Ovaska.

Blue-eyed, blond German actor Friedrich Mücke (1981) appeared in more than twenty films since 2006. Many of his films tackle issues around the former GDR. He had his breakthrough with the adventure comedy Friendship! (2010) with Matthias Schweighöfer. He reunited with Schweighöfer in the comedies What a Man (2010), Russendisko/Russian Disco (2012), and Vaterfreuden/Joy of Fatherhood (2014). He co-starred with David Kross in the thriller Ballon/Balloon (2018).

Christoph M. Ohrt in HeliCops (1998-2001)
German autograph card by SAT. 1, Berlin. Photo: SAT.1 / Trenkel. Christoph M. Ohrt in the TV series HeliCops (1998-2001).

Christoph M. Ohrt
German autograph card.

German actor Christoph M. Ohrt (1960) is best known for his roles in popular TV series like HeliCops - Einsatz über Berlin (1998), and Edel & Starck (2002). He also appeared in German and some international films.

Thure Riefenstein
German autograph card.

Thure Riefenstein
German autograph card.

Thure Riefenstein (1965) is a German-Serbian born actor, writer and producer who started his career at German Broadway theatres such as the Berliner Ensemble and the Hamburger Schauspielhaus. He is best known for playing strong and enigmatic heroes or villains in international films and TV Series. He worked with Steven Soderbergh in Behind the Candelabra (2013), starring Michael Douglas and Matt Damon. On television, he guest-starred in the US-Series Leverage (2012) with Timothy Hutton, The Brink (2015) with Tim Robbins, and the Sci-Fi series 12 Monkeys (2018). Next, he can be seen in the British drama Sophie's War (Joshua Sinclair, 2019) with Anja Kruse, Mikael Persbrandt and Claire Bloom.

Max Riemelt
German autograph card. Photo: Glampool / Uwe Martin.

German actor Max Riemelt (1984) is known for such films as Napola - Elite für den Führer (2004), Die Welle/The Wave (2008) and Freier Fall/Free Fall (2013). He had his international breakthrough as Wolfgang Bogdanow in the Netflix series Sense8 (2015-2018), created by The Wachowskis and J. Michael Straczynski. Riemelt is announced in several new films, including the sequel Freier Fall 2/Free Fall 2 (2020).

Matthias Schweighöfer
German autograph card. Photo: Lee Strickland.

Blond, freckled and talented Matthias Schweighöfer (1981) is one of the most successful German actors of his generation. He is also a voice actor, singer, film director, and producer. Schweighöfer made his debut as film director with the romantic comedy What a Man (2010). It was well received by German critics and also a success at the box office. He co-starred with Friedrick Mücke in the buddy film Friendship! (2011). He directed, produced and played the lead role in You Are Wanted (2017), Amazon's first non-English-language TV series. Next, he will play Klaus Barbie in Resistance (2020), starring Jesse Eisenberg.

Timmi Trinks
German autograph card.

Timmi Trinks
German autograph card.

Timmi Trinks (1994) is a German actor, best known for the TV series and feature film Allein gegen die Zeit/Alone Against The Time. His latest film was the horror thriller Heilstätten/The Sanctuary (2018).

Kostja Ullmann
German autograph card. Photo: Max Elmar Wischmeyer.

Kostja Ullmann
German autograph card. Photo: Vanessa Maas.

Kostja Ullmann (1984) is a German actor, best known for his leading role in the award-winning coming of age drama Sommersturm/Summer Storm (2004) which gained a lot of praise throughout Europe. His later films include Quellen des Lebens/Sources of Life (2013) with Moritz Bleibtreu and Meret Becker, the espionage thriller A Most Wanted Man (2014) starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, and the comedy Mein Blind Date mit dem Leben/My Blind Date With Life (2017). He is announced for the Norwegian action comedy Børning 3 (2020), and the British drama Resonance (2020), with Pat Vega.

Jo Weil
German autograph card.

Jo Weil
German autograph card.

Jo Weil
German autograph card. Photo: Nadine Dilly.

Jo Weil (1977) is a German actor and TV presenter. He is best known for his role of Oliver Sabel in the soap-opera Verbotene Liebe/Forbidden Love. He had played the character for 15 years before trying out other pursuits, including releasing 2 singles, acting in a musical and in several films.

Tom Wlaschiha
German autograph card.

German actor Tom Wlaschiha (1973) is best known for his role as Jaqen H'ghar in the second, fifth, and sixth seasons of Game of Thrones (2011). He also appeared in films like Resistance (2011) and the TV series Crossing Lines (2013). He recently starred in a new version of the classic series Das Boot (2018). Announced is the Italian comedy L'incredibile storia dell'isola delle rose/The Incredible Story of Rose Island (2020).

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