Otto Sander

Acting

Otto Sander

Born 1941-06-30 · Hanover, Germany

Otto Sander (German: [ˈɔtoː ˈzandɐ]; June 30, 1941 – September 12, 2013) was a German film, theater, and voice actor. Sander grew up in Kassel, where he graduated in 1961 from the Friedrichgymnasium. After leaving school he spent his military service in 1961/62 with the Bundesmarine and left as reserve fenrik. Sander then studied theatre science, history of art and philosophy. In 1965 he made his acting debut at the Düsseldorfer chamber plays. After his first film work in the same year he abandoned his studies in 1967, and went to Munich to become a full-time actor. His career is closely connected with the Schaubühne theatre in Berlin under the direction of Peter Stein. From 1980 onwards Sander appeared on several of Berlin's theatre stages, among others at the Schillertheater in 1981, at the Freie Volksbühne in 1985 and in 1989 at the Komödie am Kurfürstendamm. More recently he starred in Hauptmann von Köpenick at the Schauspielhaus Bochum (2004). In 1990, he was a member of the Jury at the 40th Berlin International Film Festival. Among his best-known film roles are the angel Cassiel in Wings of Desire and its sequel Faraway, So Close! by Wim Wenders, and a shell-shocked U-boat commander, Kapitänleutnant Philipp Thomsen, in Wolfgang Petersen's Das Boot. Sander also appeared in The Tin Drum (1979) as a trumpeter and in Comedian Harmonists, a biopic about the musical group of the same name. He also played a professor in the movie The Promise about the division of Berlin by the wall. In 1999 he played a role in Rosa von Praunheim's movie The Einstein of Sex.

Acting credits

The Tin Drum poster
7.0

In 1924, Oskar Matzerath is born in the Free City of Danzig. At age three, he falls down a flight of stairs and stops growing. In 1939, World War II breaks out.

The Tin Drum

1979

Wings of Desire poster
7.8

Two angels, Damiel and Cassiel, glide through the streets of Berlin, observing the bustling population, providing invisible rays of hope to the distressed but never interacting with them. When Damiel falls in love with lonely trapeze artist Marion, the angel longs to experience life in the physical world, and finds — with some words of wisdom from actor Peter Falk — that it might be possible for him to take human form.

Wings of Desire

1987

Das Boot poster
8.1

A German submarine hunts allied ships during the Second World War, but it soon becomes the hunted. The crew tries to survive below the surface, while stretching both the boat and themselves to their limits.

Das Boot

1981

Lumière & Company poster
6.3

40 international directors were asked to make a short film using the original Cinematographe invented by the Lumière Brothers, working under conditions similar to those of 1895. There were three rules: (1) The film could be no longer than 52 seconds, (2) no synchronized sound was permitted, and (3) no more than three takes.

Lumière & Company

1995

Krabat poster
5.8

A 14-year-old orphan named Krabat flees the horrors of the 30 Years War by becoming an apprentice to an ominous master of a mysterious mill. Krabat is not only taught the craft of milling, but is also instructed in the sinister world of the darker arts. When the life of his friend and protector is threatened, Krabat must struggle to free himself from an evil sorcerer's control in a gripping fight for freedom, friendship and love.

Krabat

2008

Faraway, So Close! poster
7.0

A group of angels look longingly upon the life of humans. Berlin now is a very different place: unified in name but overrun with crime, corruption, and—in what turns out to be a key theme here—Americans.

Faraway, So Close!

1993

About Narration poster
8.0

Interdisciplinary studies put into practice is a plane on which HaF's interests and mine coincide. Ideas of fictional research projects in films emerge very early on, or of film as research device, allowing people from different disciplines to come together and discover something, to pursue a line of thought, or just be adventurous. These ideas correspond to a tendency we both have of accumulating knowledge from different sciences, for example so as to bring exact sciences like medicine together with subjects which aren't directly aimed at application, such as religious studies or anthropology.

About Narration

2025

No artwork available
10.0

No synopsis available yet.

Die Mutter

1971

The Killer Condom poster
5.2

In New York City, detective Luigi Mackeroni investigates a string of mysterious penile mutilations at the Hotel Quickie. After Mackeroni attempts to have a tryst with a gigolo he meets in the lobby, a carniverous condom bites off his right testicle and flees, which sets the detective off on a quest to stop the predatory prophylactic once and for all.

The Killer Condom

1996

Conversation with the Beast poster
10.0

An American historian (Mr Webster) comes to Berlin to visit an old man who claims to be the real Adolf Hitler and to be 103 years old. The Hitler who died in 1945, the old man says, was just one of his six doubles - one for each weekday - while Hitler himself retired into a bunker below the S-Bahn tracks and married a second time.

Conversation with the Beast

1997

Summer Guests poster
7.3

A group of people from the wealthy middle class in engage in quasi intellectual quarrels and discussions trying to find some meaning in their comfortable and indolent life. Adaptation of the play by Maxim Gorky.

Summer Guests

1976

No artwork available
NR

Romy Haag portrays Clarissa Vornfeist who dreams of fame, while Otto Sander in his role as Wilfried plans to transform her into a plastic doll using a prepared broiler.

Plastikfieber

1979

Rosa Luxemburg poster
6.6

Polish socialist and Marxist Rosa Luxemburg works tirelessly in the service of revolution in early 20th century Poland and Germany. While Luxemburg campaigns for her beliefs, she is repeatedly imprisoned as she forms the Spartacist League offering a new vision for Germany.

Rosa Luxemburg

1986

The Marquise of O poster
6.7

A German Marquise has to deal with a pregnancy she cannot explain and an infatuated Russian Count.

The Marquise of O

1976

No artwork available
10.0

Austrian flmed staged production of Euripedes' The Bacchae, portraying a conflict between the deity Dionysus, son of Zeus, and his cousin Pentheus, ruler of Thebes

Die Bakchen

1974

The Harmonists poster
6.7

Comedian Harmonists tells the story of a famous, German male sextet, five vocals and piano, the "Comedian Harmonists", from the day they meet first in 1927 to the day in 1934, when they become banned by the upcoming Nazis, because three of them are Jewish.

The Harmonists

1997

Wahnfried poster
5.2

Lake Lucerne in 1868: a passionate and forbidden affair flares up between the gifted composer Richard Wagner and the much younger Cosima von Bülow - the aristocrat is already married and the mother of four children. Contrary to all conventions, the two publicly confess their love - and break a social taboo in the process.

Wahnfried

1986

Am I Beautiful? poster
6.7

Between Munich and Seville, the destinies of sixteen characters intertwine and intersect, missing each other or colliding head-on. They are all, without knowing it, at a pivotal moment in their lives...

Am I Beautiful?

1998

Girls under investigation poster
7.0

Two young women are hitchhiking when they get picked up by a man who proceeds to sexually assault them. He disappears after that. The suspicion that the „girls" - having a reputation of being "loose" when it comes to sex - killed him, begins to grow.

Girls under investigation

1999

Werner and the Wizard of Booze poster
6.6

Comic artist Brösel trades a magic pen that helps him come up with funny stories for the promise to fulfill one of Rumpelstiltskin's wishes. The resulting animated films show episodes of the life of Werner, a plumber apprentice and motorbike enthusiast and his friends. They are interspersed with the live-action portions.

Werner and the Wizard of Booze

1990

A Love in Germany poster
5.5

In May of 1983, a man turns 49 and, with his 17-year old son, journeys to the village in Baden that he left 40 years before. He wants to discover what happened then, the truth about an affair his mother had with a young Polish prisoner of war, how the authorities came to learn of it, the lovers' arrest, and the aftermath. While his son takes Polaroid photographs, he retraces the steps of his childhood and interviews those who should remember. The story is disclosed in flashbacks that focus on the lovers (Paulina and Stanislaus), on a jealous and conniving neighbor, and on Mayer, the local SS commander who wants to find a way out of inevitable consequences.

A Love in Germany

1983

No artwork available
7.0

No synopsis available yet.

Matulla und Busch

1995

Marlene poster
5.7

In this biopic, Marlene Dietrich leaves Berlin for Hollywood, where she establishes herself as an international star through various film roles.

Marlene

2000

No artwork available
7.0

The security guard at a pawn shop in a small port town, the seasick scion of a family of sailors, falls in love with the mistress of one of his best customers, a man who is constantly in debt. Under pressure from the mafia, the customer persuades his girlfriend to meet with the security guard and distract him while he commits a robbery.

Liebe Lügen

1997

Behind the camera