Born in 1941 in Emden, Germany, Petersen scored his first big hit with a World War II submarine thriller adapted from a novel about the Battle of the Atlantic. The film earned two Oscar nominations in 1983, including Best Director. Petersen made his first film in English, the children’s fantasy feature The endless storythe next year.
In the 1990s he went on to make action and disaster films in Hollywood, where he worked with Eastwood and John Malkovich on the thriller in the line of firebefore directing Hoffman on the tape Epidemic.
Glenn Close, who co-starred with Ford in Presidential planehe said in a statement to the AFP to be run by the German”remains a special memory“.
“Although the script was exciting and incredibly intense, I remember many laughs (…) My memory is of a man full of joy of life, who did what he loved to do,” said Close. In the 2000s, Petersen directed Clooney in a perfect storm already pitt in Troy.
He died at his residence in Brentwood, Los Angeles, in the arms of his wife of 50 years, Maria Antoinette.