Over the past twenty years and across eleven feature-length works, Christian Petzold has established himself as the most critically acclaimed director in Germany. Five of his last eight films have won Best Film from the Association of German Film Critics (2001, 2005, 2007, 2008, and 2012). It is not only the critics, however, who admire Petzold’s work: his breakthroughThe State I Am In (Die innere Sicherheit; 2000) won the Federal Film Prize in Gold, the equivalent of a best-film prize for its year, an unusual recognition for an art-house film. His more recent films have only affirmed his status...

This interview mainly took place in July 2011, with a shorter followup in October 2012, at Petzold’s office in Berlin. It was conducted in German, so I include a number of original words or phrases that seem important to his cinema.

Jaimey fisher: Places and spaces, especially in small cities and towns, are consistently important in your films. Where did you grow up? Can you describe the region, the particular place, where you are from?

Christian petzold: That has to do with my parents, who grew up during the Nazi period. At the end of World War II, they were...