[Editor’s note: This interview took place at the 2014 edition of TIFF. Sundance Selects releases the film in limited theaters and On Demand on July 24th.]
I sat down with Christian Petzold after the premiere of his new film Phoenix at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival. We discussed his relationship with the Berlin Film School movement and whether his rising international success still allows him to adhere to the tenets of that movement. His continued collaboration with muse Nina Hoss is discussed, as well as his tendency to base his features on previously produced material, including his latest feature which is based on a novel adapted into a film in 1965 as Return From the Ashes (which Petzold confesses he has not seen).
