About Max Riemelt
"Self-taught", " up-and-coming actor", "shooting star", "character actor", "export hit" - there is hardly a predicate that Max Riemelt has not yet been assigned. Probably the most apt characterization comes from photographer Jim Rakete: "If he has nothing to do for half a minute, he jumps. One meter high with his tennis shoes," said Rakete about Max Riemelt in 2014. And he is still right, because it is no coincidence that Max Riemelt can look back on a career of around two decades as a film and television actor at the age of 34 and is considered one of the most sought-after character actors in Germany.
Born on January 7, 1984 in Berlin-Mitte in the former GDR, Max Riemelt gained his first experiences as an actor as a child - first on his aunt's theatre stage and in the theatre club of his school, later at the age of 13 through minor supporting roles in the television productions "Eine Familie zum Küssen" and "Praxis Bülowbogen". Max Riemelt first became known to a larger audience in 1998: He took the leading role in the ZDF Christmas series "Zwei Allein" ("Two of a kind", 1998, directed by Matthias Steurer).
Roles in TV productions such as the road movie "Ein Weihnachtsmärchen - Wenn alle Herzen melmelzen" (1999, directed by Johannes Fabrick) or Friedemann Fromm's "Brennendes Schweigen" (2000) alternated the next three or four years with first leading roles in movies like Dana Vávrová's children's film "Der Bär ist los" ("Bear on the run", 1999) or Dennis Gansels' coming-of-age comedy "Mädchen, Mädchen" ("Girls on the top", 2001).
Max Riemelt finally made his breakthrough with Dennis Gansel's drama "NaPolA - Elite für den Führer" ("Before the Fall"): in 2004 Riemelt was honoured as best male actor at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. The European Film Promotion named him a German "Shooting Star" at the 2005 Berlinale. In the same year he received the "Rising Star Award" at the Hamptons International Film Festival.
Style-creating directors such as Dominik Graf also worked with Max Riemelt: In 2006 he played the leading role alongside Jessica Schwarz in the love film "Der Rote Kakadu" ("The Red Cockatoo") for the first time and won the Bavarian Film Award as "Best Newcomer". The next collaboration between Dominik Graf and Max Riemelt marked a decisive turning point in his career: In the crime thriller "Im Angesichts des Verbrechens" (2010) Max Riemelt played the leading role, the policeman Marek Gorsky. With success: "Im Angesicht des Verbrechens" was awarded the German Television Prize as "Best Multipart" in 2010 and Max Riemelt himself was honoured twice as part of Cast and Crew: with the German Television Prize in the category "Special Performance Fiction" and the Grimme Prize in the "Fiction" competition. 2011 followed the nomination for the Golden Camera in the category "Best German Actor".
Since then, Max Riemelt has finally freed himself from the image of the "young actor" through diverse and impressively played roles in cinema productions such as "Freier Fall" ("Free Fall", 2013, director: Stephan Lacant) or "Auf das Leben" ("To Life!", 2014, director: Uwe Janson) and television productions such as "Blutgeld" (2013, director: René Heisig) and has advanced to become one of Germany's most sought-after character actors.
And Max Riemelt is also increasingly making a name for himself internationally. While the Berliner has been present at film festivals around the world for years with German productions such as "NaPolA - Elite für den Führer" ("Before the fall"), "Die Welle" ("The Wave"), "Freier Fall" ("Free Fall") and "Auf das Leben" ("To Life!"), more and more international directors are discovering the talent of the Berliner. In Eran Rekli's biopic "PlayOff", Riemelt plays the leading roles as well as in Barbet Schröder's drama "Amnesia" and Jan Komasa's film "Miasto 44" about the Warsaw Uprising of August 1944, and in the science fiction series "Sense8" produced by Tom Tykwer and the Wachowski siblings for Netflix, Max Riemelt was the only German to play a leading role in both seasons and the final.
In 2017, Max Riemelt was named Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres for his services to French film and Franco-German culture, before adding another exclamation mark to his international career in 2020: Lana Wachowski called Max Riemelt to the cast of "Matrix IV" alongside Hollywood stars such as Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss. Max Riemelt thus had the distinct honor of contributing to the long-awaited sequel to the 1999 cult film, of which he has been an ardent fan since the early days of his career.