Oliver Hirschbiegel

Oliver Hirschbiegel was a director who worked for years in his native Germany before eventually attracting international attention for films like "Downfall" (2004). Much of his work explored the horrors of the Nazi regime in WWII. Hirschbiegel was born in Hamburg, Germany. He was educated under the freedom of the Waldorf school system, and he studied painting and graphic arts at the University of Hamburg before settling on film. He directed his first film, a made for TV movie that he also wrote called "Das Go! Projekt" in 1986. He followed that with numerous TV projects before breaking through with his first major film release, "Das Experiment" (2001), a thriller based on the infamous Stanford prison social psychological experiment. His next film explored similar themes of human darkness: "Der Untergang" ("Downfall" in English), told the story of Hitler's last days. The film was hugely successful with critics and the German public. One of its scenes, in which Hitler has a protracted meltdown upon receiving bad news from his subordinates, became infamous as a viral video, with Hitler's speech mistranslated in subtitles to reflect a variety of humorous scenarios. Venturing into Hollywood, he directed the biopic "Diana" (2014), telling the story of the Princess of Wales with Naomi Watts in the lead.