Wolfgang Petersen, filmmaker behind Das Boot, The NeverEnding Story, dead at 81

Wolfgang Petersen, who rode hisacclaimed German-language film Das Bootinto a careerdirecting Hollywood blockbusters such as In the Line of Fire,Air Force One,The Perfect Stormand Troy,has died. Hewas 81.

Petersen died Friday at his home in the Los Angeles neighbourhood of Brentwood after a battle with pancreatic cancer, said representative Michelle Bega.

Petersen was perhaps best known for 1981'sDas Boot, the harrowing story of life aboard aGerman U-boat during the Second World War. In it, he accomplished the unlikely feat of making audiencesfeel for the ordinary men serving on the submarine, who were allat least nominally in service to the Nazi cause.

Das Bootwasnominated for six Oscars an enormous number for a foreignfilm including two for Petersen, for director and adaptedscreenplay.

A 'neverending act of imagination'

But the director started on very different films. His first featurein Hollywood was the 1984 fantasyadventure The NeverEnding Story,which he directed andco-scripted.

Roger Ebert said it managed to let kids know"that the story isn't just somehow happening, that storytelling is a neverending act of the imagination," and the film hasbeen dearly loved by moviegoerssinceits release.

However successful Petersen was in appealing to children, hequickly graduated to films geared toward adults. His next effortwas Enemy Mine,about an astronaut (Dennis Quaid) whocrash-lands on an alien planet and teams with a lizard-likealien (Louis Gossett Jr.) from the species he was battling inorder to survive the harsh environment.

The film was not well received by critics and didn't makeany money, and indeed,Petersen did not make another film for six years.

A creative leap

He returned in 1991 with the mystery thriller Shattered,starring Tom Berenger, Bob Hoskins and Greta Scacchi, then made an extraordinary creative leap with thecritically acclaimed Clint Eastwood film In the Line of Firein 1993.

Using technology that was new andhighly innovative at the time, the effects team digitallyinserted images of Eastwood from 1960s films into footage featuring JFK.

"It's my greatest experience after Das Boot," Petersentold Variety ahead of the movie's release. "Working with Clintwas a great experience."

In the Line of Firewas Petersen's first film to scoresignificant box office $177 million USworldwide in 1993.

After subsequent successes with Outbreakin 1995, Air Force Onein 1997, and the George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg-ledThe Perfect Stormin 2000, Petersen switched gears for his next project, Troy.

Basedon Homer's Iliad,it was filled with epic-scale action as wellas movie stars including Brad Pitt, Eric Bana and Orlando Bloom.Critics were mostly unimpressed. New York Magazine called it "a fairly routine action picture with an advanced case of grandeuritis The actors are forever striking classical poses; they're trying to memorialize the drama. But you can't force this kind of thing either you're mythic or you're not."

But in general, Petersen was helping to pioneer thecritic-proof movie Troy'sworldwide gross was $497 million US,most of it from overseas. (Adjusted for inflation, Air ForceOnewas the director's most successful film.)

Petersen was riding high, but his next movie sank him.Poseidon(2006), a leaden remake of The Poseidon Adventure,carried a production budget of $160 million US and generated just $182 million US at the worldwide box office, resulting in a huge lossfor Time Warner once promotional costs were figured in. It would bePetersen's last Hollywood film.

The director seemed to retire at that point, but a decadelater he made a film in Germany, Vier gegen die Bank (Four Against the Bank), a remake of his own 1976 German TV movie ofthe same name and based on the 1972 novel The Nixon RecessionCaperby Ralph Maloney.

The original told the story of "fourmembers of an exclusive country club who decide to rob a bank tosolve their money problems." The new film starred Til Schweiger.

Beginnings in German cinema

Born in Emden, Germany, the director got his startmaking TV movies in his home country,earning his first such credit in 1965 and making TV moviessteadily from 1971 to 1978. While working on the popular GermanTV series Tatort(Crime Scene), he first met and worked withactor Jurgen Prochnowwho would appear in several of hisfilms, including as the U-boat captain in Das Boot.

Petersen's first feature film was the 1974 psychologicalthriller One or the Other of Us,starring Prochnow. Next was1977's black-and-white film Die Konsequenz,an adaptation ofAlexander Ziegler's autobiographical novel about homosexuallove. The film was considered so radical at the time that whenit first aired on German television, the Bavarian networkrefused to broadcast it.

Petersen was married to German actorUrsula Sieg untiltheir divorce in 1978.

He is survived by second wife Maria-Antoinette Borgel, aGerman script supervisor and assistant director whom he marriedin 1978, and a son by Sieg, writer-director Daniel Petersen.