LOS ANGELES, United States — German director Wolfgang Petersen, who achieved
international fame with films “Das Boot”, “Outbreak”, and “Air Force One”, has
died from pancreatic cancer, a spokeswoman said. He was 81.
اضافة اعلان
Petersen, who
directed Hollywood A-listers including Clint Eastwood, Dustin Hoffman,
George Clooney, Harrison Ford and Brad Pitt over a career spanning five decades, died
in Los Angeles on Friday.
Born in Emden,
Germany in 1941, Petersen scored his first major success with World War II
submarine thriller “Das Boot,” adapted from a novel of the same name about the
Battle of the Atlantic.
The film earned
him two Oscar nominations at the 1983 Academy Awards, including for best
director, and Petersen released his first English-language film — children’s
fantasy flick “The NeverEnding Story” — the following year.
He transitioned to
Hollywood action and disaster movies in the 1990s, working with Eastwood and
John Malkovich in assassination thriller “In The Line of Fire,” and directing
Hoffman in pandemic-themed “Outbreak.”
Glenn Close, who
starred alongside Ford in Petersen’s “Air Force One,” said in a statement to
AFP that being directed by the German “remains a special memory.”
“Even though the
script was thrilling and incredibly intense, I remember a lot of laughs,
especially in the scenes around the huge table in the War Room,” she wrote.
“My memory is of a
man full of joie de vivre who was doing what he most loved to do,” added Close.
In the 2000s,
Petersen directed Clooney in “The Perfect Storm” and Pitt in “Troy.”
He died at his
residence in Brentwood, Los Angeles in the arms of his wife of 50 years, Maria
Antoinette.
Petersen is also
survived by his son Daniel, his wife Berit, and two grandchildren, Maja and
Julien.
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