Franka Potente
Best known to international audiences for her portrayal of the flame-haired, hyper-kinetic heroine of Tom Tykwer's Run Lola Run (1998), Franka Potente is one of Germany's fastest rising young actresses. Born on July 22, 1974, in the town of Dülmen, Potente was educated at Munich's Otto Falkenberg Schule and the Lee Strasberg Institute in New York. According to legend, she was "discovered" as an actress by a casting agent who saw her in a bar restroom one night and asked her to describe herself in one sentence.
Potente made an auspicious film debut in Hans-Christian Schmid's 1996 film Nach Fünf im Urwald, for which she won that year's Bavarian Film Prize for Young Talent; she subsequently did a good deal of television work before enjoying her international breakthrough in Run Lola Run. A huge hit in Germany and a sleeper success in the States, the film featured Potente in a state of constant locomotion, running through time and fate to save her boyfriend from the clutches of his gangster employers. Her performance, which combined urgency, unflappable verve, and surprising warmth, earned her the respect of any number of critics, and she found herself -- alongside director and then-boyfriend Tom Tykwer -- being hailed as one of the European cinema's most exciting new talents.
Earning a German Shooting Stars award from the European Film Promotion in 1998, Potente went on to do starring work in a number of films, including Tykwer's The Princess and the Warrior (2000), which cast her as a lonely mental hospital nurse who falls in love with a disturbed army veteran-cum-thief. The actress' growing international stature was also reflected in her casting as Johnny Depp's girlfriend in Blow (2001), Ted Demme's account of the life of George Jung (Depp), a drug dealer who was instrumental in the rise of cocaine use in the 1970s. International fame continued to grow for the striking actress when, following a small role in the Todd Solandz satire Storytelling (2001), she was cast opposite Matt Damon in director Doug Liman's fast-paced thriller The Bourne Identity. Inspired by Run Lola Run (it not only utilized that film's star, but prominently featured a track from the Lola soundtrack in its advertising campaign), the action thriller started to expand Potente's strong cult appeal into full-blown commercial viability.
After spending the next two years mostly absent from movie houses, Potente re-teamed with Damon for the sequel, The Bourne Supremacy in 2004. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide
Potente made an auspicious film debut in Hans-Christian Schmid's 1996 film Nach Fünf im Urwald, for which she won that year's Bavarian Film Prize for Young Talent; she subsequently did a good deal of television work before enjoying her international breakthrough in Run Lola Run. A huge hit in Germany and a sleeper success in the States, the film featured Potente in a state of constant locomotion, running through time and fate to save her boyfriend from the clutches of his gangster employers. Her performance, which combined urgency, unflappable verve, and surprising warmth, earned her the respect of any number of critics, and she found herself -- alongside director and then-boyfriend Tom Tykwer -- being hailed as one of the European cinema's most exciting new talents.
Earning a German Shooting Stars award from the European Film Promotion in 1998, Potente went on to do starring work in a number of films, including Tykwer's The Princess and the Warrior (2000), which cast her as a lonely mental hospital nurse who falls in love with a disturbed army veteran-cum-thief. The actress' growing international stature was also reflected in her casting as Johnny Depp's girlfriend in Blow (2001), Ted Demme's account of the life of George Jung (Depp), a drug dealer who was instrumental in the rise of cocaine use in the 1970s. International fame continued to grow for the striking actress when, following a small role in the Todd Solandz satire Storytelling (2001), she was cast opposite Matt Damon in director Doug Liman's fast-paced thriller The Bourne Identity. Inspired by Run Lola Run (it not only utilized that film's star, but prominently featured a track from the Lola soundtrack in its advertising campaign), the action thriller started to expand Potente's strong cult appeal into full-blown commercial viability.
After spending the next two years mostly absent from movie houses, Potente re-teamed with Damon for the sequel, The Bourne Supremacy in 2004. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide
Filmography
The romantic comedy Try Seventeen is a coming-of-age tale directed by Jeffrey Porter. Jones Dillon (Elijah Wood) is a young writer who is living on his own for the first time. Jones continually writes letters to the father he has never met, while his mother Blanche (Elizabeth Perkins) resides in Texas. Enrolled in college, he quickly abandons the stifling dormitory setting and eventually his classes as well. He finds an apartment in an old building in the city and befriends his neighbors. The place is filled with colorful artists and other nonconformist types. Jones gets romantically involved with struggling actress Lisa (Mandy Moore) and photographer Jane (Franka Potente). He buys furniture from Ma Mabley (Debbie Harry) and proceeds to try and lose his virginity while searching for his absent father. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
A determined medical student uncovers shady goings on during a prestigious summer anatomy course in this German thriller. When Paula Henning (Run Lola Run's Franka Potente) learns that she's been accepted to a highly competitive internship at a Heidelberg research institution, she's ecstatic. The daughter of a simple family doctor, she prefers to model herself after her terminally ill grandfather, who was once dean of the same Heidelberg university. Stern lecturer Prof. Grombek (Traugott Buhre) promises that half the students won't be around when the course ends; his prediction turns out to be true, but it's not because of the brutal exams. It seems that a group of renegade doctors is performing dissections on unwilling, still-living victims, which helps explain the artful laboratory in which plasticized human remains are lovingly displayed. Paula stumbles onto this plot when a recent acquaintance turns up on her dissection table, his blood the consistency of rubber. Studious to the extreme, Paula investigates his death with scientific determination -- despite the flirtations of handsome fellow student Caspar (Sebastian Blomberg) and the feel-good urgings of Gretchen (Anna Loos), her sexually promiscuous but utterly brilliant roommate. Just as Paula is preparing to expose the existence of the Anti-Hippocratic Society, a Nazi-affiliated group of medical malcontents, Gretchen falls prey to their extreme methods. Soon Paula, too, is in danger of becoming just another addition to the display case. Extremely popular in its native country, Anatomie was dubbed into English for American release under the title Anatomy. A sequel was in production as of 2002. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide
An ambitious, working-class medical graduate with dreams of becoming a research physician arrives in Berlin eager to begin his internship at a reputable clinic in director Stefan Ruzowitzky's sequel to his 2000 sleeper Anatomie. Motivated by his desire to provide patients with human warmth often lacking in medical treatment, and driven by his desire to discover a cure for the rare muscle disease that has crippled his brother Willi, Jo (Barnaby Metschurat) eagerly begins his internship as scheduled. When Jo is approached to perform an unauthorized operation on the daughter of a colleague, he initially refuses, only relenting after personally witnessing the graveness of her situation. His successful operation and detailed dissertation drawing the attention of Professor Mueller-LaRousse (Herbert Knaup), the charismatic Mueller-LaRousse subsequently invites Jo to join in weekly gatherings in his "research salon." As Jo becomes a member of Mueller-LaRousse's elite group of talented physicians, the stress of his internship is soon lifted, replaced by a compromising situation that may not only cost Jo his career, but his life as well. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
One of Germany's most important female directors, Doris Dörrie chose the subject of the universal quest for happiness for the film Bin ich Schön?. Set in Spain and Germany, the film interlaces individual stories of broken hearts and broken dreams with aspirations of new beginnings. On a hot afternoon in Spain, Linda is standing beside the road wearing a thin summer dress and carrying a handbag. A car stops and Werner, a robust-looking German, picks her up. She shows him a note which says, "I am deaf-mute and in need of your help." Werner is touched. As they move off together, Linda throws her handbag out of the window. In a near-by motel, Klaus is on the phone to Munich trying to convince his reluctant girlfriend Franziska to come down to Spain. Linda and Werner have checked into the next room where Werner is asking Linda to hit him with his belt. Plots and subplots intertwine until the film reaches a climax during a religious procession. In an ironic way, the film celebrates life with a message that life is here today and then it's gone. No beginning, no end and enjoy it while you can. Bin ich schön? was screened as part of the New German Films at the 49th International Berlin Film Festival, 1999. ~ Gönül Dönmez-Colin, All Movie Guide
Following the life of cocaine-trafficking pioneer George Jung in a way that recalls Martin Scorsese's Casino, Blow recounts the man's days from his 1950s childhood in Boston to his downfall in the 1980s. George (played by Johnny Depp) begins his life as the son of Fred (Ray Liotta), an earnest breadwinner, and Ermine (Rachel Griffiths), who frequently walks out on them in pursuit of a more fulfilling life. When George moves west to California in the late '60s, accompanied by best pal Tuna (Ethan Suplee), he becomes an entrepreneur in the marijuana business, which soon spreads to the East Coast as well, with girlfriend Barbara (Franka Potente) smuggling the product during her stewardess shifts. George is arrested in 1972 -- at which time Barbara dies of cancer -- but George finds a new ally in Diego (Jordi Molla), who proposes the idea that he become the American conduit for Colombian kingpin Pablo Escobar (Cliff Curtis). George flourishes in the heyday of the disco era, and falls for Mirtha (Penelope Cruz), a self-serving bombshell who eventually has a daughter with him. Trouble escalates as the FBI threatens to bring George and his crew down, while he desperately tries to be a stable parent to his young offspring. Blow also features Paul Reubens and Max Perlich in featured roles. ~ Jason Clark, All Movie Guide
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